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TRING Super ball park plans unveiled
A STATE of the art ball park costing £38,000 has been unveiled by Tring Youth Town Council and is expected to be up and running by spring.
The special park, pictured above, which includes a five-a-side football pitch, a basketball court, cricket stumps, seating and litter bins will be built at the recreational ground in Miswell Lane.
Katie McManus from Tring Youth Town Council gave a presentation on the plans to Tring Town Council on Monday, January 23 and was given full backing by councillors.
Youngsters came up with the idea for the ball park in October 2003 and have been fundraising to help pay for it. Now they have £8,000 to put towards the project and have applied to the East of England Development Agency for a grant to fund the rest.
Teenagers from the youth council have consulted with local residents about their plans. Katie said: “We had quite positive feedback and residents would like to see it up and running. We would also quite like it in Miswell Lane because there isn’t much to do at that end of Tring and it is originally where the skate-park was going to be.”
Planning permission is not needed for the park which can be installed in a matter of weeks.
Tring Youth Town Council will find out if it has secured funding from the EDA in February.
Breakfast of champions
A BRISK morning run, that involves pupils and parents, followed with a hearty breakfast at St Bartholomew’s Primary School in Wigginton has bagged them a national award.
The school has beaten others from all over England to the title of Schools Breakfast Champion from the Home Grown Cereals Authority.
Judges were impressed with the school’s Monday morning cross country running club, which involves parents, who join youngsters on their runs before cooking them a filling breakfast in the school canteen.
The competition marks Farmhouse Breakfast Week running from Sunday, January 22 to Saturday, January 28, which highlights the importance of breakfast and the range and quality of breakfast produce in the UK.
Nutritionist Fiona Hunter, who writes for magazines and has appeared on television and radio, visited the school on Monday (January 23) to present the award and talk to youngsters.
She said: “Eating breakfast is not only the best way to kick start your day, but studies have shown that children who eat breakfast have superior cognitive function and therefore pay more attention and respond more quickly to tasks.”
The running club has been held during the autumn and spring school term for the last three years and has grown in popularity. School teacher and PE coordinator Ruth Rutt set up the club and joins the group on their runs, which start at 7.45am.
Afterwards parents serve up fresh smoothies, fruits, juices, hot drinks, bacon rolls, toast, cereals and porridge to youngsters.
Mrs Rutt said: “I was very very surprised when they said we had won the whole thing, but I think they liked the idea of the parents being involved and starting the day in a good way.”
Maud Davis from the Home Grown Cereals Authority said: “They are a shining example of how other schools should be doing things. It is fabulous, the parents benefit too because they have become fitter as a result of it and many of the kids have won running medals. It is just a lovely thing to do and everybody benefits.”
Only landlord in the village
A BUSINESSMAN is celebrating 26 years since his family first bought the Valiant Trooper in picturesque Aldbury.
Tim and Helen O’Gorman own the popular family pub - which has
featured in the Michelin Guide - and Tim also runs The Greyhound Inn - the village’s second drinking hole, which is also a country hotel and
restaurant.
 Tim moved to the village when his mum, Dot O’Gorman bought the Valiant Trooper in an auction in 1979.
The pub was going to be shut down, but residents raised a petition and the Trooper Road pub was sold to Dot at auction for £88,000.
Tim, aged 44, took over the pub when his mum retired in 1996.
She still lives in the village, but spends much of her time travelling and she will join Tim and other members of the family to celebrate the anniversary next month.
Two-years-ago a position to run The Greyhound Inn came up with brewery, Hall and Woodhouse, and Tim jumped at the opportunity.
Tim said: “I came to the village when I was 18.
“We have three children who went to the local village school.
“It is a great village to live in. It is very safe, there is no trouble here.”
Driver’s life could have been saved
Young motorists urged to buckle up in the car
A POPULAR Tring fitness instructor, who died in a car crash, may still be alive today if he had been wearing his seatbelt, an inquest heard last week.
Nicholas Christopher Wood, 21, of Icknield Way, died
when he lost control of his car in Beacon Road, Ivinghoe and collided with another vehicle.
The former Tring School student, nicknamed Chucky by his friends, was seen by witnesses struggling to gain control of his blue Ford
Fiesta on the afternoon of Sunday, September 25, last year.
During an inquest held at Amersham Magistrates Court on Wednesday, January 18, witnesses - who had been driving and walking along
Beacon Road on the day of the accident - described how
Mr Wood’s car swerved to miss an oncoming car and then three pedestrians, before smashing into a black Peugeot 406.
PC Stephen Moffat from the Thames Valley Police Collision Investigation Unit said Mr Wood was making snap decisions as he tried to get through a tight gap while driving too fast.
He said: “This is an event that only took a second or so to occur.”
He added: “Had Mr Wood been belted then he would have probably survived the collision.
“The car would have de-accelerated very, very quickly. Mr Wood would have been de-accelerated by his steering-wheel and windscreen.
“He would have been travelling towards the hub of his steering-wheel at the same time as his air bag exploded to meet him. This is why sadly he has received so many internal injuries. It is very sad.”
Mr Wood worked as a fitness trainer at Ashridge Management College and also helped train young cricketers at Lord’s Cricket Ground. He was a keen footballer, playing centre half for Tring Tornadoes and Tring Corinthians.
Coroner Richard Hulett said: “Nicholas was driving his vehicle down there just a little bit too quickly, it is as simple as that. He has come down there, possibly on a wet surface, just got up too much speed and began to lose control. It was pot luck as to whether there was a collision or not. I am sure some get away with it.
“He was a young fit man, by and large they are the ones with the best chance of survival in a modest collision, but I think PC Moffet is absolutely right - the seatbelt was the difference between surviving and not surviving,” he added.
“This was a survivable collision for a young fit person,” he stressed.
“Every year I hear a number of cases, which are nearly always young men, aged between 18 and 25, who for some reason, which is very obscure to me, drive without wearing their seatbelts.
“It is quite literally the difference between life and death and that is the great shame and tragedy of this case.”
The inquest heard that the group travelling in the black Peugeot 406, were on their way to have lunch at the Cow Roast Inn in Tring.
There were two couples in the car with their two young children, none of whom were seriously injured.
At the time of the crash both mums had their children on their laps inside their seatbelts.
PC Moffat said: “Both children were trapped within their retrospective mothers’ seatbelts.
“If the collision had been at higher speed the outcome would have been much worse. It is an atrocious way to travel with your children,” he added.
Mr Hulett said that Mr Wood died from extensive internal haemorrhage and recorded a verdict of accidental death.
Road users to get the standard UK hump
TRING will not be getting new lower European speed humps after an investigation by Hertfordshire Highways.
Plans to put speed humps in Grove Road in September, last year, were postponed so road engineers could look into the possibility of the new style of speed hump.
The humps, which are already used in parts of Europe, are 10mm lower than those used in the UK - which are 75mm high.
Hertfordshire County Council spokesman Lara Hejazi said: “It was only something that we were looking into the possibility of using. Any speed humps we put in have to conform to UK regulations. The European style humps are only one centimetre lower in height. It was just a possibility we were looking into, but it is not something we are going to be doing.”
The European-style speed humps are 65mm high, 1.6 metres wide and are made from rubber. This means they are lower and wider, giving cars a larger platform to drive over.
Work to install normal UK road humps in Grove Road is expected to start at the end of the month (January) along with a whole host of other safety measures being introduced into roads across the town.
Traffic calming measures are expected to be installed in six streets in Tring over the next four months.
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