The man from the council, and my head.

My meeting was this morning, I gently wandered into town. I left myself some lee-way I wanted to check on the work as I went; the minor paranoid in me was convinced that since I'd complained they'd visited in the night and replaced all the work correctly. Nope all still present and incorrect.

Walking from Bridge Street I passed section 5 between the pub and the old post office; continued up to section 4 on the last car parking bay, some people taking a note of me snapping pics. I stopped someone "Can you see any difference?" "Yeah those are new" pointing at the new blocks. Good it's not just me then.

Onto section 3 on the pedestrian crossing; then section 1 where the slabs switch to the slippery grey ones; woah 3 to 1 where's 2. Standing on 1 I checked my notes and looked up; 2's on the opposite side of the road. I then carried on to the new bit they've dug up and replaced which I'll dub section 0.

Standing outside the Swan just before half nine I spy a fluorescent jacket heading up High Street, I'll call him M. We were now just waiting for a rep from Balfour Beatty.

While we waited we walked through from 0, it turns out sections 1 and 2 are where bollards have been knocked over, that's WCC work and explains why they've only been tarmacked and not slabbed.

Section 3 also covers the tactile slabs. "Those are different too" said M. Onto 4 "Yep" and then, as no sign of the BB rep, down to 5. "It doesn't help that it's a bit damp" I said as we walked down then, as we reached the road, "Actually it has helped, see". Facing the sun and catching the reflections of the blocks there was a huge matt patch in the middle of the sheen. M stomped on a couple of the new ones, they moved. "That'll all need replacing" he said.

Headed back to see another fluorescent jacket, I'll call him J, who was on the mobile; no doubt wondering where we were.

Section 0, looks like a switch from a square cover to a round one. They've obviously re-used the blocks they'd removed, but they haven't filled in around the cover. "We'll grout that in" says J before walking over to another nearby round cover "That's not been done right". He's right the grout is cracking away, I hadn't even noticed it's such a common sight.

Onto 1 & 2 which we wave past as WCC work. Forward to 3 on the pedestrian crossing "Hmm yeah" muses J. "Can you get these blocks anymore?" asks M (I'd already told him that you could). "They're a standard brick" answers J.

Onto 4 same again. "Did anyone liaise with you?"J asks of M. "Nope" replies M "Looks like they used whatever they had to hand". "Yeah this'll do" says J miming a brick in his hand.

Onto 5, I point out the different surface as we approach, M pointedly stomps on the blocks again. "The trouble is" I say "this is a relatively high traffic area". This is emphasized as we have to move out of the way four times to let vehicles through.

J sighes "Any more down there?"indicating Bridge Street. "You haven't done anything down there have you?" I ask. "Oh yeah tons" replies J. "Oh!" said I "Well then again it's just a tarmac surface, you wouldn't really notice" (anyone prove me wrong by all means).

As a final point I mentioned the ironwork on the corner of Mitton Street, the square blocks at an angle and sticking out of the ground. Luckily it's facing the 'correct' way on the one-way street so you're not hitting the angle straight on "It got re-done when they had the leak" said I. J groans "Just before the bank holiday Monday" he recalls; they'll take a look.

So the result is the pavement's going to be re-done, with the correct blocks. Yay!

See it pays to be fussy and apparently there's a five year guarantee so you've got that much time in which to complain. Why didn't anyone do the same for Vicar Street in Kidderminster, can anyone recall how long ago it was that they dug up the pavement outside of the Roland Hill Centre on the Woolworth side? I mentioned it to M "Even looks like they used the same blocks there as they did here"


My head aches, my neck aches, I'm falling asleep. Is something going on with the air-pressure? It's been like this for a couple of days now, and I've found that normally means movement either toward big rain or big sun. I'm predicting a downpour in the next day or so. You heard it here first :-)