Tuesday 20th January: OCSG meeting

Dear all,

Just a reminder about the lecture on Tuesday evening, this will take place in Room 2.32 in the Cassie Building, it should be very interesting as University staff will attend as well as staff from NCC, EA and NWL.
If we have some time left, we will update everybody on the current issues in the Ouseburn.
I have also started to work on the OCSG Action Plan, this should be ready for consultation at the end of February at the latest!
Looking forward to see you all next week and in the meantime, have a look to the following work of "water art".

Happy New Year 2009

Our group should have its busier year ever and we are kickstarting it with an evening meeting, on Tuesday 20th January, with a presentation on the elusive Water Framework Directive application in UK by Malcolm Newson, Tyne Rivers Trust Director.
Paul and I will also attend a Newcastle Great Park Advisory Committee meeting on the 19th, where we will have a chance to present our ideas to this group.
Finally, we will write in the next 7 weeks the OCSG action plan for the Ouseburn. We will send our first draft to all our members for comments and suggestions. I will give more details during our next meeting.

Sebastien

PS: I attended the public meeting on the September 2008 flooding in the Ouseburn in Brunton Park before Christmas. St Aidan's church was packed and Newcastle City Council, Environment Agency and Northumbrian Water presented their views on the flood events and their response to it. Some members of the audience were irate as they thought they were hearing the same thing again and again. Nonetheless, John Shipley reiterated that these three agencies will carry on working together to solve the current flooding issues in the upper Ouseburn for the years to come.