Plans for out-of-town Crewe police base to be decided
A report from a council planning officer said Cheshire Police were committed to keeping a presence in Crewe town centre, in the form of a police hub to enable public access to the service.
'Better access'
It said details still needed to be finalised and suitable premises secured before the existing police station was closed.In relation to the planning application, council officers said it was "disappointing" an active travel route would be disrupted.They added parking requirements of more than 200 spaces and the need for security meant there was limited scope for landscaping.These issues needed to be balanced against the benefits of moving the police base, it added."It will allow the deployment of officers across the whole of the local policing area with better access to strategic road network with easy access into Crewe town centre and throughout the wider urban area," the report stated.The building would accommodate approximately 300 staff and operate on a 24-hour basis, 365 days of the year.
This news was gathered by the Local Democracy Reporting Service, which covers councils and other public service organisations.
Read more Cheshire stories from the BBC and follow BBC Stoke & Staffordshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Times
39 minutes ago
- Times
Seals are thriving — but are there too many of them?
'There is no creature born … which more resembles a human baby in its ways and its cries than a baby grey seal,' the British ecologist Frank Fraser Darling once said. The subtitle of Alix Morris's thoughtful book about the return of the seal to North America holds that these are the sea's most charismatic creatures, and that insistence does feel like a bit of a stretch, given the competition. Yet clearly Morris is enamoured by their 'liquid eyes,' their 'doglike faces' and their bodies like 'blubbery bananas'. Perhaps this is why a seemingly innocuous creature has ignited furious debate over what our relationship to the natural world should be. There are also charming stories in her book's opening chapters of seals who have touched human lives. There is Hoover, who learnt to mimic the New England accent of the man who adopted him — 'Get outta there!' — and Andre, who would migrate hundreds of miles up the east coast each spring to the harbour of the man who first took him in. It is all too usual in environmental journalism to read about devastating declines, but the seal is a story bucking that trend. By the mid-20th century grey seals and Atlantic harbour seals (what we know in the UK as the common seal) had been almost eradicated from US waters, pushed to the brink by bounty hunters, acting to protect commercial fish stocks. • Read more book reviews and interviews — and see what's top of the Sunday Times Bestsellers List Yet now they are thriving: there are 61,000 harbour seals off the east coast of the United States, and 28,000 greys. The grey seal population on Sable Island — 95 miles off the coast of Nova Scotia — has risen from a few thousand animals in the 1960s to 400,000 today. Such narratives give a tantalising glimpse of nature's capacity to heal, if only we would let it. In A Year with the Seals we learn about the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972, the groundbreaking US legislation that turned around the fortunes not just of seals but of certain whales as well. We spend time with the women of the Marine Mammals of Maine, a group dedicated to the rehabilitation of seals, rescuing them from fishing nets and botched shark attacks and enthusiastic beachgoers in search of a selfie with a pup. I am forever impressed, despite our deserved reputation as a cruel, destructive species, by this capacity to attend to the needs of other creatures in ways that are unparalleled in any other animal. But the book really hits its stride, and broadens its message, when it begins to tackle the complexities of conservation. It isn't hard to feel compassion for a species on the verge of extinction because, almost by definition, there aren't enough of them to cause any bother. It is when conservation measures have some success that conflicts with people arise. An animal's resurgence can feel like an invasion to those who have grown up without them, even if their numbers are still a long way off from their historic population. I have spent a long time researching wolves, whose rapid return to Europe has caused no end of conflict, but even a creature as apparently benign as a seal has its passionate detractors. There are the commercial fishermen who see seals as competition, and sport fishermen who repeatedly lose their catch before they can reel them in. There is an enlightening section set outside Seattle, where the Puyallup tribe believes seals and sea lions are endangering salmon stocks. • The Sunday Times Bestsellers List — the latest UK book charts Most powerful is the rise in fatal attacks by great white sharks, attributed to an explosion in seal numbers along the coast, luring in the sharks that hunt them. 'No sharks or seals are worth a young man's life,' one local resident said in a town hall meeting in 2018, held after a surfer's death off the coast of Massachusetts. It is a brave biologist who would argue otherwise. Morris asks: what is the right amount of any species? The natural amount? Removing conservation measures from an animal that has successfully rebounded risks plunging it 'into a continuous loop of depletion, conservation and recovery', and yet allowing their numbers to keep on climbing means adapting our lifestyles to make space for them — not something that we are particularly good at. Ultimately, wildlife conflicts are 'a manifestation of deep-rooted social conflicts': urban versus rural, hunters versus conservationists, those who work the land versus the tourists who visit for some notion of the wild. The seal is a 'particularly convenient scapegoat' for such underlying tensions. In the end the answer to Morris's question of how much is enough isn't really about the species at all, but humans and what sort of relationship we want to have with the natural world. In short, it's complicated. Maybe that's an unsatisfactory conclusion, but I am still surprised how often those working in conservation fail to appreciate that others with skin in the game have opinions that deserve to be heard. A Year with the Seals is a useful, all too rare account by a writer who has made the time to listen. Adam Weymouth is the author of Lone Wolf: Walking the Faultlines of Europe (Hutchinson Heinemann) A Year with the Seals by Alix Morris (Ithaka £18.99 pp304). To order a copy go to Free UK standard P&P on orders over £25. Special discount available for Times+ members.
BBC News
an hour ago
- BBC News
Berkshire school children take part in 'time capsule' roof
Primary school children have been decorating tiles for their school's roof replacement Sutton Primary School in Wokingham Road, east Reading has added to its 123-year history by creating a "live time capsule" project which started in March 2025, is part of Reading Council's ongoing programme of works to upgrade old Victorian school Head of Alfred Sutton Primary School, Robert Howell said the children have loved being part of the project, "it means their names will forever be enshrined in the history" which he said "is a lovely thing". Children and teachers decorated and signed their own roof tile which will be placed alongside 65,000 other tiles expected to be used in the included pictures of children's hobbies, pets and computer game others wrote to future pupils asking questions, such as whether they have flying cars or if people now lived on Mars. The project which is due to be completed early next year involves replacing the roof, guttering, windows and doors as well insulating to reduce energy Howell said: "The children have loved being part of a live time capsule event where their pictures and messages will be part of the roof and revealed in possibly 100-years-time when they need replacing again."With a Victorian building there is a constant maintenance schedule."He explained that the project is "huge" for the school and the main hall which the roof covers has been subject to "some leakage". The roof replacement is part of Reading's School Fabric Condition Programme funded by the Department for Education's Schools Condition Rachel Eden, lead councillor for education and public health, said the replacement of the building roof is a "major project which is vital for the school and its pupils".She said: ""Reading is lucky that our heritage includes several Victorian school buildings but it does mean the council needs to keep up a programme of improvements." You can follow BBC Berkshire on Facebook, X (Twitter), or Instagram.
BBC News
an hour ago
- BBC News
Volunteers rescue badger after Braintree slurry pit fall
A badger had to be rescued after it fell into a slurry pit at a sewage works and was unable to escape. Volunteers from the North East Essex Badger Group were called to the site in the Braintree area at about 08:00 BST on slurry was so deep the female was unable to stand up and was "slumping down in exhaustion" on their arrival 15 minutes later. Group chairman Renee Hockley-Byam said it was hauled out with a grasper, "growling and not at all happy" and it "managed to slip out and escape". "Ideally, we'd have cleaned it up before we released, but it didn't want to be cleaned up and off it shot to its sett," she said. "Fingers crossed it's OK." The sewage works is next to a badger sett and the animals regularly forage for insects in the compound overnight. Mrs Hockley-Byam said: "It's not uncommon for badgers to fall into slurry pits, but this is a first for us."Most badger groups around the country have dealt with it one time or another - it's a known hazard."The group's volunteers have previously visited the sewage works to reunite a lost cub with its parents, but "that call-out was a lot less smelly", she added. Follow Essex news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X.
