Join us at Hayes Carnival 2011

This year like last, Transition Heathrow has been invited to run an area at the Hayes Carnival in Barra Hall Park on Saturday the 9th of July. We would like to invite all Heathrow Village residents and associate groups to join us at the carnival. Also we’re inviting any groups that might want to run a stall or activity in our area to contact us at info@transitionheathrow.com.

In addition to last year we will be entering a float in the procession. We’d like to invite you all to join us on the float so that we can hopefully win a prize for the villages. We are busy designing and building a pedal powered float/ soundsystem and need help making costumes and coming up with a dance. This is a great chance to show off the villages.

If you would like to help make the costumes please drop into Grow Heathrow on any Tuesday from 1-5pm or anytime from Wednesday the 6th of July to Friday the 8th. If you would like to help create and learn a dance with an expert dance teacher then please come to Grow Heathrow at 2pm on Friday the 8th of July. If you would like to join the float on the day please join us at the start of the procession by 11am on the 9th of July.

See you there!

Winning the first step

Heathrow residents and community activists celebrated the adjournment of the court case that was seeking to evict the squatted community garden project “Grow Heathrow” set up on the site of the defeated third runway.

Over the past six months the former Berkeley Nurseries site has been transformed from a derelict space to a thriving community garden and social space, playing host to a range of events from a banquet and film screenings to acting as a base for solidarity actions for striking airport workers and supporting the No Third Runway campaign.

The court case has been adjourned to the central London county court after the Deputy District Judge ruled that higher authority was needed to rule on the case.

Speaking outside court Transition Heathrow member Jo Rake, 21, said:

“We are celebrating today’s ruling as a step towards rebuilding the Heathrow communities that were blighted for so long by the threat of airport expansion. The number of people who turned up at court today, from local residents to airport workers and activists showed the importance of this project for the Heathrow communities and also the wider campaign for food security. David Cameron talks about a ‘big society’, we’re already doing it.”

With less than two weeks to run a campaign of resistance, statements of support have been flooding in to the website and over 700 people have now signed either the online or paper petition. This support is summed up by local resident Alf Pereira also speaking outside court:

“This group can do good for the local community – the first time in hundreds of years they can change the outlook of the area. I am proud to say I live in this area because this group is here. If they get evicted I will go. It will be the last straw; the community deserves better”.

The project also has the backing of local MP John McDonnell:

“This inspirational project has not only dramatically improved this derelict site but it has lifted the morale of the whole local community in the campaign against the third runway and in planning a sustainable future for our area. We cannot lose this initiative and I will do all I can to enable it to continue”

Support is still needed and ideas are in the pipeline to run an autumn event to get new people involved in the campaign that have found out about it due to the eviction threat.

For more info on this and eviction updates keep checking the website at: www.transitionheathrow.com

Hayes town to play host to September festival

In the finest tradition of EMI, and its link with HAYES, the town centre will once again come alive with LIVE MUSIC, ART and CULTURE, as local radio station 91.8 Hayes FM, puts the fun back into our area with a 9-day HAYES TOWN FESTIVAL at the end of SEPTEMBER.

The festival will run from the 18th to the 26th September and will bring together some of the finest local talent from the world of Rock, Pop, Classical, Acoustic, World and Asian music, that also aims to highlight some of the many activities currently being undertaken in the area. The hope is that it will bring more people to the town centre in Hayes.

Its just not about the music, the weeklong event will also offer a fun and exciting line up of activities including workout exercises, dancing, street performers with a  varied range of stalls from Hillingdon NHS, Age UK as well Fair Trade from 12 midday to 2pm.

The 9-day festival is being supported by Hillingdon Community trust with support from Hillingdon Training. The programme launches on the 18th with the finest local dance groups, Bollywood Dancers, even a Micheal Jackson dancer, with street performers.

Local MP, John McDonnell, himself a Beatles fan, said, ” From the  early days of EMI through to the 1960s when the Beatles records  were produced here, Hayes has played a had a place in the history of Rock and Pop and Modern culture”

Sutish Sharma, Manager of Hayes FM, said, “this is a  great opportunity for people to watch and hear some of our brightest local talent, as well as people from all over the place to come to Hayes town and connect with the place that for many years was a centre of all that was great about British music, arts and culture”

What makes this programme unique for the area, is that for the very first time, music art and culture is being used to reinvigorate the town, and support local business.

People can tune in on a regular basis for updates by tuning in on 91.8 FM wave band or log on www.hayesfm.org

Transition Heathrow at Hayes Carnival – Sophie’s blog

I was asked to help out Transition Heathrow for the Hayes Carnival in Barra Hall Park on Saturday 10^th July and immediately I said yes. I love the project both for its local implications and its wider political vision. Transition is all about recognising climate change is happening and that oil will and is becoming more and more scarce. It’s all positioned in a framework of what positive impact it can have on a local and global level. Plus I love a local day out and Hayes Carnival promised to be a great way of getting out there and meeting more of the community in the local area.

So on a beautiful (and incredibly hot) sunny day, amongst the genteel setting of Barra Hall park, Transition Heathrow set about transforming its little corner of the park into a beautiful representation of how life could be post-transition, with yards and yards of bunting, ex-airline pilots turned gardeners, tea and cakes and smiles in abundance.

If the transition movement is that its all about the positives, then Hayes Carnival provided an excellent opportunity to show how we deal with issues of power created by burning oil and coal. We just don’t need it. We have renewable that can provide so much of our electrical needs.

To make this point real, Transition Heathrow invited our friends from Coltek to come with their solar powered generator to provide power for the area, and as the blistering sun beat down, we danced to the music on the Transition stage, with live acts curated by another of our friends, the guys from the award winning folk club the Magpies Nest. It was a beautiful line-up, with music from the likes of Paris Thompson, Anna Log, Troubadour Rose, James Mcdonald, Aaron Jonah Lewis, JAW and Perhaps Contraption. The solar power also extended to the Renewable cinema, a lovely blacked out tent, strewn with cushions, showing a selection of films curated by more of our friends: Just Do It Films.

The café was run with aplomb and again set out a vision for a post-oil future. We had a pedal powered smoothie maker, creating delicious smoothies that involved some personal work. A smoothie never tasted better than one you had to pedal a standing bicycle to make….. There were home made cakes using vegetables we had grown in Sipson. We also had the legendarily efficient Rocket stoves. A beautifully constructed cooking stove using recycled oil drums and burning wood. These boiled our water so we could provide tea and coffee to the thirsty carnival revellers.

Grow Heathrow, the sister project of Transition Heathrow was there, giving away plants and seeds and general growing advice to encourage people to get growing locally. Screen printing workshops were also provided and more friends, this time from the radical social centre 56A, provided bike maintenance free of charge. And finally there was a free shop giving away clothes free of charge.

The Transition movement is all about creating community reliance with bottom up solutions but it is also about having fun with your neighbours, family and friends. For me, Hayes Carnival showed how a community can come together and be a showcase for a better future.

For photos of the day check our flickr page: http://www.flickr.com/photos/47991844@N06/sets/72157624348584707/