Low Carbon Headington
Launch suggestions, Monday 2 June 2008
ALTERNATIVES
Climate Groups
- Apply for Community Action grants from Council
- Set up bulk-buying group with other low-carbon community groups for low-carbon technologies
Focused Initiatives
- Groups to produce brichets; sandbags…
- Headington Green Plaque award for homes that show improved energy
efficiency
- Create more Headington eco-sculptures
Events
- More street parties
- Get involved in Headington Festival at Bury Knowle
- Competition for best adult and child recycled junk art
- Organise “low-carbon footprint” at Festival, i.e. whirligig pedal-power music; pedal-power local fruit smoothies…
- Farmers’ Market
- Regular leafleting (2)
- In different areas, i.e. Risinghurst, Wood Farm, etc.
Growing Your Own
- Space to sell surplus veg and fruit from local gardens and allotments at the weekend
- Group to discuss growing veg and fruit in gardens
- More allotments
- Plant more street and garden trees and recruit volunteer tree wardens to tend them (2)
Recycling
- Lobby Council to provide central point for depositing tetrapaks, batteries, etc.
- Open a low energy shop
- Swap shop. Next one at Headington Community. Centre, Gladstone Road on Saturday 3rd May 2008 – email: headingtonswapshop@hotmail.co.uk
- Start a Make-do-and-mend club
- In Victoria Road, they put up a green balloon to swap various items they no longer need and to meet people
TRANSPORT
Buses
- Quick bus between Summertown and Headington
- Walking buses to schools
- Improved bus services from Headington across the city and to rail station
Cars
- Road pricing for Oxford
- Pollution monitoring on London Road
- Stop replacing verges with hard standing
- Initiate traffic surveys, how many cars are single-occupancy at rush hour
and other times
- Have regular car free days to allow families to cycle or walk
- Make Oxford a car-free city
- Initiate community car share schemes using least-polluting vehicles,
on-line booking and free priority parking around the neighbourhood (2)
- 20 mph zone in most roads (2)
Cycling
- Pleasant and safe cycle route to city centre and Cowley Business Park (3)
- Headington cycling club offering short distances for families
- “On Yer Bike” campaign
- Install a cycle-only phase at the junction of London and Windmill Roads
- Give priority to cyclists over cars
Pedestrians
- Give priority to pedestrians over cars
- Set up “Walk to Work Days” down Headington Hill
HOME IMPROVEMENT
Eco-homes
- View Avril Stedeford and Gavin Killip’s homes as examples of eco-homes (3)
Emissions measurement
- Hold a “Carbon Footprint” party with friends and neighbours
- Purchase gadgets that calculate energy used by various appliances and rent
them out for £5 (or donations) for 24 hours, donating money to worthy cause
or lend them out (2)
- Start a Headington Carbon Rationing Action Group (see Tina Fawcett, tel
761697; email: tina.fawcett@lycos.co.uk (2)
- Sign up to www.imeasure.org.uk to monitor gas and electric in the home and
and compete with reducing emissions (2)
- Get streets to send in meter readings once a week and publish “league tables”
of consumption
Expert Advice
- Train someone to do free home energy assessments to give advice re insulation, etc.
- Provide advice on solar energy (in local context)
- Host eco-house event with presentations and supplies (like the one last week at the Town Hall)
Miscellaneous
- Create policy against concreting front gardens (which will need permission
by October, 2008 anyway)
- Subsidise telecommuting office space in Oxford
- Campaign to get residents to turn down thermostat by 1 degree Centigrade
- Reverse Headington’s status as a smoke control zone to allow the burning of
wood
Solar/Wind Power
- Provide a register of solar heating service providers – as regards best models, installation and maintenance (2)
- Campaign for council tax rebates for everyone with solar panels, insulation
- Encourage Council to calculate tax bands according to carbon emissions
- Encourage estate agents to sell solar panels as a desirable asset
- Look into feasibility of wind turbines for ordinary house with long garden
- Look into feasibility of solar panels for flat roofed institutions such as the hospitals and Brookes, i.e. Old Road Campus
- Encourage energy saving
SHOPS/PUBS
Overall CO2 Reduction
- Offer business rate discounts to businesses who commit to CO2 emissions reductions
Lights/Indoor or Patio Heating
- Shorten time light bulbs are one, particularly at night (3)
- Ban patio heaters in pubs (3)
- Circulate energy data on patio heaters and plasma TVS to pubs as part of
general energy-saving leaflet
Plastic Bags/ Packaging
- Ban plastic bags in shops (6)
- Encourage local take-aways to use biodegradable/recyclable packaging
and provide recycling collection
- Pressure local supermarkets on either no or biodegradable packaging
HOSPITALS
Lights/Indoor Heating
- Remove overnight lighting from new hospital buildings on Old Road
WAYS AND MEANS
General
- Lowering carbon emissions in Headington will have to be done in pockets,
i.e. Old Headington, Risinghurst, Sandhills, etc.
- Find a simple way of exchanging ideas: What was used, Cost, Who did it, How
- Find a way to sell green lifestyles to those who are unlikely to be able to
afford going green
- Lobby for planning permission based on green potential
- Create a poster to advertise Headington future events and deliver them door
to door
Shops
- Weekly or monthly plant stall in Bury Knowle Park
- Persuade Farm Shop in Stanton St John to open outlet in Headington
- Persuade Headington Co-op to sell locally made bio-diesel from waste vegetable oil (www.goldenfuels.com)
- Promote retail shops in Headington, not cafés
- Support local charity shops
Churches
- Get local churches involved (2)
- Form eco-congregations (as in Holy Trinity)
Schools
- Educate students on recycling and minimising waste (3)
- Convert schools into lower energy viz. solar heating and insulation and foot-
fall energy (2)
- Give students free blue wheelie bins
Individual Action
- Fly less, or never
- Campaign for tax on air fuel
- Work from home
- Get on to your MP (2)
- Publicise local organic veg deliveries more
