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Kidical Mass - Halloween special
Kidical Mass Exeter is holding its sixth family bike ride as part of an ongoing campaign for safe cycling routes for children, young people and families.
Leigh Curtis
Kidical Mass Exeter returns for a Halloween-themed bike ride on Sunday 29 October as part of an ongoing campaign for safe cycling routes for children, young people and families.
The ride will set off from Belmont Park in Newtown at 11am and take a turn through Exeter’s streets before ending at Cowick Barton playing field in St Thomas.
Participants are invited to wear fancy dress and decorate their bicycles with colourful lights.
Everyone is welcome to join the ride whether or not they have children.
The event is designed to create a safe environment for families and friends to cycle together while highlighting the need for cycling routes that enable children and young people to travel safely and independently wherever they live.
It is intended to demonstrate that besides being fun, streets that keep children and cyclists safe work for everyone.
It also aims to promote a healthier, lower carbon future in which active travel modes are the norm.
The first Kidical Mass took place in 2008 in Eugene, Oregon, and has since become a worldwide celebration of cycling with events taking place around the globe.
Exeter City Council is about to seize the helm of Exe estuary maritime life: will it steer it onto the rocks?
Charges for waterways access are set to be imposed from the quay and canal basin to the coast under proposed Harbour Revision Order powers after six years of rising costs propelled by pursuit of Port Marine Safety Code compliance. They risk driving away craft of all sizes, from kayaks to yachts, while redevelopment threatens canalside land – but it’s not too late to change course.
The redevelopment of KING GEORGE V PLAYING FIELD by Exeter City Community Trust has begun after a scheme to install a full-size artificial football pitch with floodlighting, refurbish and extend a sports pavilion and expand its car park was approved by Exeter City Council last August. The decision was made by officers and did not go before the council’s planning committee. It followed a July 2024 council decision to transfer 40 acres of land at the Countess Wear playing fields to the trust which was made without a promised “wide-ranging, fully open public consultation” on the proposal. The trust instead held an informal consultation in December 2024. The council executive is due to hear an otherwise unexplained item related to the scheme next month described as “relating to financial ask of c.£475,000”.
£46 million of debt – including £392,000 owed to former employees – will be left unpaid by MIDAS CONSTRUCTION LIMITED following its dissolution, according to documents filed at Companies House by its administrator. The 2022 collapse of Midas, which had seven offices in Exeter and across the south west, led to hundreds of job losses and left numerous projects stalled including schools, homes, hotels and warehouses.
Significant storm damage has prompted emergency works to shore up the bank separating the Exe estuary from the BOWLING GREEN MARSH nature reserve at Topsham. Exeter City Council has repeatedly postponed a flood defence scheme proposed for the site, which it owns. It says that the emergency works are “not likely not be a long-term solution” and that “longer-lasting repairs for the areas of worst damage” are “currently being investigated”.
The developer of a scheme at 130 FORE STREET is seeking to amend the design, height and layout of the building, which extends down West Street towards Grade I listed St Mary Steps church, by converting the building’s basement level – previously occupied by Crankhouse Coffee – from commercial to residential use and reducing the number of flats in the scheme, which was originally approved thirteen years ago. Exeter City Council rejected an attempt to add a fifth storey to the scheme in 2023, a decision which was upheld at appeal last year.
The government has said it will write off 90% of the SEND SERVICES deficit accumulated by Devon County Council to the end of March this year. The Devon deficit reached £171 million last October, among the largest in the country and £62.9 million more than the limit agreed with the government as part of its “safety valve” deal, according to a county cabinet report published last month. Devon County Council leader Julian Brazil said it had since risen to around £200 million. The council welcomed the announcement, although it will have to agree to change the way it offers SEND services under as-yet unpublished government plans, adding that it would need to “work through the detail” as part of its budget-setting process.
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Spotlight
Labour and Conservative councillors join forces to block Exeter city centre antisocial behaviour initiative
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