Concrete Cows Week
‘THE past 30 years have been a difficult time for Steerforth & Son, purveyors of fine concrete cows to the aristocracy since 1836.
| The Milton Keynes rodeo had trouble attracting a crowd |
In fact, it could be said that the bottom has rather fallen out of the concrete cow market in the past three decades – or at least since Milton Keynes was created.
But, as Nikolai Kondratiev famously observed, economics goes in cycles and the good times are here again for the ailing firm.
The Guardian announces that Milton Keynes (or MK, as it is known to its few friends) is to double in size over the next 20 years, overtaking such cities as Nottingham, Leicester and perhaps even Liverpool.
The Government plans to build 70,000 new houses in what will be the biggest urban expansion in Britain for 50 years, boosting the town’s population from its current 210,000 to 370,000 and beyond.
And that, of course, means that dozens, perhaps even hundreds, of new concrete cows will be needed.
All of which is good news for our friends at Steerforth & Son, but less good news for anyone or anything living in the countryside immediately surrounding MK.
Squirrels will have to find new places to store their nuts, badgers will have to look for an alternative venue wherein to cavort for the pleasure of Ron Davies and his friends, and Buddhists will have to find new woods in which to meditate.
Nor should any of the above count on being able to use Edward James’s private half-acre wood in Essex, least of all the Buddhists.
The Telegraph reports that 51-year-old Mr James has been told to apply for planning permission before he and a few friends can sit cross-legged among his own trees and meditate.
However, despite a complaint from a local resident and an objection from Essex Wildlife Trust (which is worried about damage to trees), Rochford district council is being advised to grant the permission.
”The whole thing has got ridiculously out of hand,” Mr James tells the paper.
”I was told I would need planning permission because it was change of use from woodland to meditational woodland.
”I had to fill in the same forms that you would need to build a skyscraper.”
In which case, we suggest that Mr James builds said skyscraper. That would shut his whinging neighbour up.
Om, as they’re no longer allowed to say in Essex….’
Posted: 6th, January 2004 | In: Broadsheets Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
