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During the pre-election period before May’s local elections in the borough, there are restrictions on council communications. This means your consultation newsletter will look a little different over the coming weeks and will focus on essential updates only. Our usual format will return from Wednesday 20 May.
At a glance – live consultations, surveys and updates
- Loddon Valley Garden Village design code – closes 11 May
- Keeping active strategy – closes 12 April
- A4 London Road proposals – closes 29 March
- Best Start Family Hubs – closes 3 May
- Safer speed limits programme – closes 1 May
- Woodley Traffic Regulation Order – closes 11 September
- Update – Covid Memorial Woodland
- Update – health visiting and school nursing
- Update – Winnersh Library
- Update – engagement and consultation strategy
- Other chances to have your say – Neighbourhood Plan
- Other chances to have your say – learning to drive
 Click on image above to enlarge it.
Loddon Valley Garden Village – shape its design
A consultation is open on the draft design code for Loddon Valley Garden Village.
The site has been identified as the largest strategic site for new development in the emerging local plan update.
We've already received several planning applications for the proposed new community, which could include around 3,930 homes, schools, green spaces, shops and a large country park.
A design code is a set of rules which guides what a place should look and feel like. It explains things like how streets are laid out, how buildings should relate to each other, where green spaces go and how people will walk, cycle and travel. It helps make sure everything fits together well.
Your views will help make the design code clearer, easier to use and more locally informed. Have your say until 11 May.
 How do you keep active?
We'd like to know and understand people’s real-life habits and barriers in the borough when it comes to being and staying active.
You might be a dedicated runner. You might love going for a walk. Or you might wish you could do something active – if you were able to.
We’d love to know, so we can create the best and most locally informed strategy, and make physical activity across Wokingham Borough more accessible for everyone.
Our survey’s open until 12 April.
 Last chance to comment on road proposals
It’s your final opportunity to give your views on plans to improve access into Reading on the A4 London Road and Suttons Seeds Roundabout.
Almost 500 residents have already commented on proposals to introduce two new sections of dedicated bus lane. Have your say until this Sunday (29 March).
 Improving support for young families
We’re relaunching our children’s centres and we want to know what you think.
Our new Best Start family hubs aim to make it easier for families to find support when they need it, in places that feel familiar.
We’d like to hear from families in the borough about the support they’d like to see the hubs offer.
Currently, families tell us it can be hard to know where to go for help. Best Start family hubs aim to bring support together under one roof – for families from pregnancy right up to when children reach 19, or 25 for young people with special educational needs and disabilities.
Give your views in our short survey until 3 May.
 Help make our roads safer
We want to improve road safety across the borough and are inviting you to tell us where you think there should be lower speed limits.
We want to use a new speed limit policy, we adopted in January, to introduce safer speed limits in places where pedestrians, cyclists and children are at risk.
To help us shape this programme's first 12 months, we’d like you to tell us which roads and areas you think should be priorities.
Submit your suggestions until 1 May.
 Click on the image above to enlarge it.
Woodley traffic restrictions – have your say
As part of the new cycle lane linking the centre of Woodley to Palmer Park in Reading, we’re trialling some traffic restrictions to keep people safe.
They’ve been introduced under an experimental Traffic Regulation Order, during which we'll run a six-month consultation to monitor how they’re working in practice for regular users of the road. What are the everyday impacts?
In Woodley, double yellow lines have been painted along Woodlands Avenue between Lytham Road and Roslyn Road.
To help keep the road clear for users, there’s no waiting or loading along the northern side of this section of the cycle route and there’s no waiting along the southern side.
Give your views on the restrictions until 11 September.
 Update – Covid Memorial Woodland
North of California Country Park, our Covid Memorial Woodland continues to come to life as a peaceful place for remembrance.
In the last year, volunteers, school pupils and local groups have planted thousands of young trees and scattered wildflower seed. The woodland is now starting to take shape.
Some of you answered our call on Engage Wokingham Borough to volunteer and attend tree planting sessions last March.
Work now continues. As the ground dries after the wet winter, new pathways will be created to make the woodland easier to explore when it opens later this year. We’ll keep you updated.
Thank you for sharing your views on health visiting and school nursing back in November and December. They've helped inform the Health Visiting and School Nursing Needs Assessment, which can be found on the Wokingham Borough Observatory website. On Pages 80 to 84 of the Needs Assessment, you can read a summary of residents’ views.
 Update – Winnersh Library
Winnersh Library is moving from its current site in The Forest School to a temporary base at Rainbow Park Community and Children’s Centre, while the plan for a more permanent home at Winnersh Community Centre is developed.
Public engagement has highlighted the importance of an easily accessed local library and we have worked with a community focus group, including Winnersh Parish Council and the school, to plan the move.
The change will allow the library to extend opening hours that have been limited by the safeguarding need for students to have sole access during school hours.
The move to Rainbow Park will take place during the Easter school holidays (28 March to 13 April) and was agreed by our decision-making executive last Thursday (19 March).
 Update – engagement strategy
We have set out our commitment to engaging and consulting with you.
Our executive approved a new Engagement and Consultation Strategy for the authority last week, which sets out how we’ll make sure you’re involved in decision-making.
The strategy includes the principles by which we will engage and consult, as well as the methods it will use. The principles committed to are:
- We will be flexible, proportionate and use a mix of informal and formal opportunities for involvement
- We will consult and engage at appropriate times in decision-making
- We will provide the right information and time for meaningful input
- Our consultation and engagement will be easy to understand and take part in
- Our consultation and engagement will be meaningful, with findings used in decision-making and implementation
- Our consultation and engagement will be strategic and coordinated
The strategy sets out the ways we’ll make sure we hear from you when making or implementing a decision.
We’ll select the best methods for different engagement and consultations, to make sure the right people are heard from.
Thank you to the 1,000+ residents who valuably gave us your views during consultation on our strategy.
Other chances to have your say
Arborfield & Newland and Barkham parish councils would like to know what their residents think about future housing development in the parishes.
They want to update their joint Neighbourhood Plan – specifically, how it engages with planning applications. Alongside taking a survey, residents can find out more at an event at Barkham Village Hall this Saturday (28 March) from 2pm to 4pm.
The Government is considering whether learner drivers should complete a minimum learning period, before being allowed to take their practical driving test. The Department for Transport wants to know what you think.
UK learner drivers can currently book their practical driving test, as soon as they have a provisional licence and have passed the theory test. Have your say until 11 May.
What you might have missed
Here are some of our other recent resident newsletters:
See our full list of 10 newsletters you can subscribe to.
If you need help taking part in a survey, call our customer service team on 0118 974 6000 or visit a borough library.
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