Dawlish News
Radio 1 and BBC Learning will offer a month of free activities for teenagers across Exeter and Teignbridge in the run up to the Big Weekend on May 28, and 29.
Exeter certainly got their £100,000 with most of the media stating the event as 'Radio 1's big weekend in Exeter'. I would say it's closer to Dawlish than Exeter, but no mention of Teignbridge who also coughed up £100,000 for the event. Poor show by TDC not to have pushed for a mention in the media of our participation in financing the event.
Nearly 100 tickets for Powderham Castle’s summer music spectacle, BBC Radio 1’s Big Weekend have been dished out to Teignbridge councillors.
@ZIGGY - thanks for the heads up on this. i would have thought that this could be taken as a conflict of interest. at the very least could be construde as something else.
I wonder how many tickets have gone to any of the worthy charities in Teignbridge?
Shame on any councillors who accepts the offer of 2 tickets and does not pass them on to a worthy cause in the district.
In fairness to the media and Radio 1 if they advertised it as Teignbridge then far fewer people would know where that was compared to advertising it as Exeter.
As as for the free tickets, I wonder how many councillors used freebie tickets from the MUSE concert in Teignmouth in 2009. I do agree they shouldn't be given them for this though. In fact unless they are at an event as a direct representative for a particular reason with a role to play I don't think they should ever be given or accept freebies.
I wonder if Teignbridge District Council has a gifts and hospitality policy to avoid accusations of bribery and corruption?
Cllr Alan Connett
8 hrs ·
Big Weekend traffic management for Kenton, Starcross and Exminster areas.
Headlines from a meeting I had with Council officers this week so I could update you are below:
Important to note that Teignbridge Council plans to send a letter with full details to households.
Residents parking permits are not being issued and there will be no special parking arrangements/restrictions for residential side roads and streets in the villages.
The A379 between Swans Nest roundabout and Cockwood AND New Road in Starcross will be a 'freeway'. No stopping/parking allowed.
In Starcross, the Strand car park will be closed from, most likely, Thursday 26th May for Big Weekend use.
The New Road car park and the car park/spaces at the Pavilion/sports field will be available for residents.
Church Road/Estuary Road between Starcross and Red Lodge will be closed except for residents and Concert traffic. Cyclists and walkers can still use it, but be mindful of the traffic.
The No2 bus will continue to run through the villages. The special Big Weekend buses will use the Powderham road.
The traffic lights at Southtown in Kenton will be turned off that weekend - but manually controlled temporary lights put in to manage the concert traffic.
There will also be manually controlled 3 way traffic lights at the Pillars/New Road junction in Starcross. Again, to help holiday and concert traffic.
The gates for the Big Weekend open at 10am on Saturday and Sunday (28-29 May), with the programme starting at 11am. Event finishes at 10pm each day.
The Matford park and ride site is the designated drop off/pick up point with buses running from there to the Big Weekend. There are also dedicated buses from the bus station running to and from the concert.
Extra trains are planned stopping at Starcross too for concert goers. Park and rides are being opened at Haldon rececourse and at Dawlish Leisure Centre.
There will be a lot of signage on the roads around the whole area directing Big Weekend traffic to the relevant parking/drop off points and the traffic organisers are hoping to have extra parking enforcement officers in the locally too.
I hope this is a helpful summary. Look out for the letter from the council which should have all the information we'll need.
Any queries about traffic management - email me direct at alan.connett@btinternet.com and I'll do my best to get replies from the council or respond myself.
Well you never know, this might be a crafty plan to make sure the whole area is awash with traffic wardens (or whatever they are called these days) who will ticket as many wrongly parked vehicles as they can, which will end up making the council a HUGE profit on their investment of £100,000 
So then will the profit be seen as a good thing or a bad thing!?
