Above: Vigil for Gaza in the centre of Hebden Bridge on Friday 2nd January

2008 ON THE HEBDEN BRIDGE WEB
NEWS HIGHLIGHTS OF THE YEAR

Here is a sample of the hundreds of news items which have appeared on the Hebden Bridge Web over the past 12 months. Town controversy centred on the Garden Street Development, Calderdale's attempts to close down Kerbside and the Fustian Knife sculpture in the square. Hebden Bridge's cultural life was greatly enriched by another successful Arts Festival, the Hebden Bridge Handmade Parade and the World on your Doorstep Festival. Read more

Below: some of the many hundreds who gathered for carols in the square this Christmas Eve

GARDEN STREET DEVELOPMENT
David Fletcher has put in an appeal against refusal of planning permission. See Planning Watch for having your say. See also The Garden Street Development, a Hebweb feature giving the background and news from 2004 until the present. - 23 Dec

There are plans to demolish old fire station and tarmac as temporary car park. See news.

Sustainable Transport Group urge significant improvement to local rail network - more info - 14 Dec

KERBSIDE: TALKS BREAK DOWN
Sita refuse to recycle with Kerbside. Public urged to write to the 7 Conservative members of the Calderdale Cabinet, and Hazel Blears, and return their Sita boxes. More info - 9 Dec

Local recycling firm gives Kerbside a Christmas boost

Snow - see photos with many thanks to those who sent in their pictures.- 7 Dec

INSPECTORS PRAISE CALDER HIGH
“Calder High is a good school.” This is the judgement of the Ofsted inspection team who said that our local comprehensive has a number of “outstanding” features including an excellent curriculum and an “exceptional” range of additional activities. More info 3rd Dec

Snow! - 2nd Dec
See more photos

The Mists of Pecket Well
Photo: Sandy O'Connor (29 Nov)

Packed square for turning-on of lights
more photos, - 22nd Nov

Hebden-based Thingumajig Theatre, who co-produced the Handmade Parade earlier this year appear at Square Chapel - more info - added 25th Nov

Superfast web, TV and phone
Report of public meeting held on Wednesday (19th Nov) to unveil proposals to bring fibre to the Upper Calder Valley. The proposed new network would give local people access to ‘super-fast’ phone, video and internet services, and be owned by the community.

Plans: wine bar in Holme Street opposite Riverside School, apartments for the former adult education centre and 6 new dwellings at Old Chamber. See planning watch - 19th Nov

New Film Society for Mytholmroyd - more info

Hebden Bridge students in Les Miserables - see news

New town in Calderdale? - meeting in Hebden Bridge - see news - 10th Nov

Hebden Bridge Picture House is booming: a fantastic combination of mainstream, art-house and foreign films, the Picture House offers so much more than a standard cinema including hot drinks and home-made cakes served by friendly staff. - 30th Oct

Local Food for Local people - talks from Suma and Hughes Family bakery, and cake samples. Saturday morning, 8th November - see events

Countryfile - John Craven was out and about around Hebden Bridge this week to record an edition of Countryfile for BBC1, Sunday 19th October.

Hebden Bridge: " the great unwashed" - see news

Upper Valley Forum meetings - see events

HBOS Jobs - Gordon Brown offers to meet our MP, Chris McCafferty about worries over job losses. - 9th Oct

GARDEN STREET - Calderdale Council's Director of Regeneration & Development Ian Thompson, responsible for all aspects of the Garden Street development process inside the Council, attended Hebden Royd Town Council on Wednesday, 8th to answer questions from Town Councillors about issues to do with the area. - 8th Oct

KERBSIDE - talks with SITA didn't go well but are set to continue. Paul Brannigan of Kerbside says no decision will be made without real consultation with the community, via a public meeting. - 7th Oct

Archive - updated to include home pages from 2003

GARDEN STREET: Action group call on the Planning Committee to reject officers' report, citing factual inaccuracies, misquotations and, above all, lack of balance. Read more - 23rd Sept

Hebden Bridge Trail on your iPod, with audio narration by local actor, Rob Garrett. See our audio-video section or the Hebden Bridge History Walks page - 19th Sept.

Town Talk 12 - from Hebden Royd. Read attacks on Calderdale over its failure to recycle with Kerbside, and for the lack of progress with Central Street improvements. Also disability issues, station car park and a list of Town councillors.

Swimming Pool Association - questions still unanswered, once again being asked. Trustee Dorothy Sutcliffe fails to attend council meeting for second time. See forum thread - 7 Dec

Expand Hebden Skatepark - video now available - Following its premier at the Trades you can now see the film on You Tube. The film explains why the space is so well used and the desperate need for its expansion.

Street Science comes to Hebden Bridge - listen to the discussion at the Alternative Technology Centre between a leading nuclear scientist and those opposed to nuclear energy. Radio 4, 3.45 pm Tuesday 2nd December. Listen again now

KERBSIDE PUBLIC MEETING - over 200 hundred people turned out this cold Saturday (29th) morning. Cllr Peter Coles: "I am ashamed of what Calderdale has done to Kerbside". Paul Brannigan: Calderdale were not interested in recycling before Kerbside and now local people have voted overwhelmingly for Kerbside black boxes. Report and photos

Above: Hebden Bridge cartoonist Fran Orford seeks to raise money for children's disability charity by drawing Christmas cards - more info

Local playwright Christopher Reason has dramatised the next Classic Serial for Radio Four - a 2 part adaptation of the satirical nove, The Good Soldier Švejkl by Czech writer Jaroslav Hašek, set in WW1.

Photos section - updated

Trades Club pledges to Beat the Burglars after raiders smashed their way into the building and took some stock. - 11th Nov

Hebden Bridge Bonfire 2008 - more photos

The Seamy Side of Town - Hebweb discussion continues. Inspector Chris Norbury joined the debate, and revealed actions he and his colleagues have already taken. 3 Nov

"We're really busy with our bed and breakfast and most get in touch through the Hebweb - Laura of Laurel End - see accommodation

Frieda Hughes (daughter of Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes) presented the poetry prize at the Ted Hughes Festival - 26th Oct TH Festival - photos and info

Bradford Interchange closes for 10 days - news

Station Road closure: all day Sunday, 26th October - for resurfacing of road and car park. This car needs to be moved. More info and larger photo

Hebden Bridge student Jemima Foxtrot stars in a powerful new BBC radio play about racism and poetry in the 21st century - see news - 19th Oct

Hebden Bridge student elected to Youth Parliament as MYP - 17th Oct

HB Partnership's celebration of community and activist groups showed what a truly remarkable town we live in - Read more - 8th Oct

Ted Hughes Festival - opens on 22nd October when Andrew Motion will present the Young Poets Award at the Ted Hughes Theatre in Mytholmroyd.

Permaculture and Transition Towns - on Sunday, 5th October at the Trades - see events

Small Ads - houses, flat, apartment, rooms and cottage to rent, Maths tuition, learn to draw, car for sale and much more

New station car park
works starts Monday 6th October

Free Radicals - next session on 28th September - see events for full details

Coffee Station wins award - Third Prize in the Best Station Retail Outlet, at the National Community Rail Awards held in Plymouth on Friday night (22 Sept).

Looking critically at the Rochdale Canal,
our "linear park" - more info 18th Sept.

Nearly 4 months after Under the Bridge was first posted on the Hebden Bridge Web, the Courier reports that "drugs film shocks town" - see our radio and video section for the video, click here for Courier report - 15th Sept.

Hebden Bridge artists commissioned to create installations for Slow Art Trail opening in the Yorkshire Dales this month - more info - 12th Sept.

HebWeb News - see over a hundred pages of news items (mostly with photos) and dozens of shorter items from this year's news of Hebden Bridge. See also our archive section for previous home pages, older news and forum messages. Please help the Hebweb by supporting our advertisers.

Asbestos, now banned in the EU, kills up to 4,000 people a year in the UK alone. This week's New Statesman reveals how the industry hid the truth for decades and why the death toll will certainly continue to rise." - Full article - see also Hebweb feature

Blackshawhead Village Fete - Saturday August 30 2008 - cancelled due to waterlogged field

Guardian on Hebden Bridge: "There probably isn't a more Guardian-y place in the universe. The arty class started coming here in the late 60s, attracted to its then ludicrously cheap stone mills and millhouses. Now you can't move for louche lesbians, academics, journalists, tortoiseshell spectacles and jazz musicians with questionable haircuts. Even the local brass band is so cool it plays ska." - 23 Aug

Latest play from Hebden Bridge's Square Peg Productions, reviewed (with photos) by Geoff Tansey - 17 Aug

Boarding at a Pecket Well farm, Peter Kelly taught at Calder High from 1958 to 1961, and has sent the Hebden Bridge Web some of his memories. Read more on our History pages - 9 Aug

Useful sites - updated, links checked, police contact info added

New Hebweb section - Archive

JOHN MORRISON

• VIEW FROM THE BRIDGE- all 98 episodes - first appeared on the Hebden Bridge Web and then published as the highly successfull Milltown Trilogy. Buy them online or read what Sir Bernard and others have said about the books.
  
  The perfect gift for the uncherished relative.


• A Kind of Love-in - scenes from life in a small South Pennine milltown.


• 'Milltown: an Unreliable History: 'Some samples - to either whet your appetite or leave a nasty taste in the mouth.
  
  
• Women are from Venus, Men are from Mytholmroyd

JILL ROBINSON

• BERRINGDEN BROW: Memoirs of Single Mother with a Crush- a novel by local author Jill Robinson published as a book by Pennine Pens. Read online samples

• Sylvia Plath Forum - hundreds of thousands of words discussing this US poet, buried in Heptonstall.



• Poems from Glyn Hughes
  - see features