Godiva Festival Headliners Announced

Godiva Festival has announced that this year’s Main Stage will be headlined by The Verve’s Richard Ashcroft on Friday 5 July, pop phenomenon Paloma Faith on Saturday 6 July and the legendary Beverley Knight will close the festival on Sunday 7 July.

Other Main Stage acts so far include Sam Ryder, The Brand New Heavies, The Primitives, PBN and The Go! Team.

Tickets for the event in the War Memorial Park go on sale at 9am on Friday 1 March.

Full information is available on the Godiva Festival website.

Hearsall Song and Storytime

We are looking forward to our very first nursery rhyme nativity session. We’re a part of Hearsall Baptist Church: the church with the Christmas star of hope on Queensland Avenue.

We would love to see you at our special lively, immersive event aimed under-5s along with their families and older siblings.

It also marks the final Christmas we can meet in this iconic building.

https://facebook.com/events/s/nursery-rhyme-nativity/6968385376581456/

It would be really helpful if anyone interested in coming to our nursery rhyme nativity could complete this form.

https://surveyheart.com/form/6583ed2ac06eec3c154f3c45

To get the most out of the event, you can also add yourself to the WhatsApp group below!

https://chat.whatsapp.com/EWr1QyImiFYIoFMY8z8BOw

Hearsall Star Petition

A petition has been raised to save the Hearsall Star and parts of the Hearsall Baptist Church buildings.

https://edemocracy.coventry.gov.uk/mgEPetitionDisplay.aspx?id=470&fbclid=IwAR0iXnSwjV7cxQNAVitWj6szR3SvdXoujCBdQf0EtzbxRR3EzZmYGBmX7Dw&TPID=21379241

Kensington Road Surgery

There is a mistake on page 25 of the December / January issue in the article on Kensington Road GP surgery.

The 3rd paragraph is repeated instead of the 4th paragraph, which has been omitted but should have read as follows: “For some time, Kensington Road has been under particular pressure, as those of us who are registered there will know. The staff, doctors and their support team alike, worked hard to cope in the face of those pressures. For all their best efforts, however, they struggled. That is not intended as a criticism of those working at Kensington Road at the time, although many frustrated patients took to social media to take them to task. Those online comments were unfortunate but understandable, though difficult for the staff to read.”

Our apologies to our readers and to the author of the article, Stuart Linnell.

Hearsall Baptist Church in the 1960s

ECHO has been given access to archive film material of Hearsall Baptist Church dating back to the 1960s. Three films exist, one covering the period of the building of the new church in 1960-61, one focusing on the Sunday School, and one looking at arts and crafts.

We are uploading these to the ECHO Facebook page for all our readers to experience.

There is more comment and information on page 6 of the new issue of ECHO (December & January) which will be on sale shortly.

BUS CHANGES FROM SUNDAY 5 NOVEMBER

This is ECHO’s understanding of the imminent changes to bus services in the area but if anyone knows different please let us know. These changes affect both National Express Coventry (NX) and Stagecoach services.

The Albany Road/Earlsdon Street route is currently served by a combined service 2 / service 51 half-hourly service on weekdays and Saturdays:

• 2 (NX) – hourly (6.57, 8.20, 9.02 etc. from Pool Meadow)
• 51 (Stagecoach) – hourly (6.27, 7.31, 8.31 etc. from Pool Meadow)

and on Sundays:

• 2 (NX) – hourly (9.05 – 19.05) but there is no 51 (Stagecoach) service

The timetables which have been published online by Transport for West Midlands (TfWM) and NX say that from 5 November:

The 2/2A (NX) runs via Spon End, Hearsall Lane etc. on weekdays, but there is no evening service:

• 2 (NX) – hourly (6.27, 8.57, 9.57 etc from PM) but no service after 13.57.
• 2A (NX) – hourly (5.57, 6.57, 7.57 then no service until 14.57, 16.12, 17.12, 18.12)

51 (Stagecoach) – hourly on weekdays + Saturdays: (6.27 – 20.31 from PM)
51 (NX) – hourly on Sundays only (6.35- 18.35 from PM)

The upshot is that on face-value the centre of Earlsdon (on the Albany Road/Earlsdon Street route) currently has a weekday half-hourly service (2/51) and will now have an hourly one (51 only).

It is hard to see how this ties in with the Liveable Neighbourhood plan to reduce car usage in central Earlsdon.

We hope that there will be a 2B service and the timetable has simply not been loaded to the websites yet. Unless that is the case then the statement two weeks ago by Ed Rickard, Network Director for National Express, who said: “The 2 and 2A timetable will change and buses will no longer serve Earlsdon. During peak daytime hours the route will extend from Tile Hill to Westwood Business Park and during off-peak daytime hours it will extend to Cannon Hill Shops. The 2B service will continue to serve Earlsdon.” seems to be not accurate.

It seems inconceivable that this can have changed so completely in two weeks since that announcement, but equally since there is no 2B service currently the statement was never clear in the first place, and at best should have said that a 2B service will be introduced to serve Earlsdon as a partial continuation of the existing 2 service.

ECHO has asked for support from some local councillors (Earlsdon, Whoberley and Sherbourne wards) to see if any of them are aware of any more details or have a view on these changes. They have acknowledged the issue and are looking into it, but time is running short.

Please let ECHO have your comments both before and after the changes are introduced.