Bath City Farm's Apple and Pumpkin Day on Saturday attracted a lot of families, and the children loved taking part in all the different activities to do with apples and pumpkins. More local residents are discovering the farm which is located at Kelston View, as well as its children's club for 5 to 10 year-olds which runs on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 3.30pm to 5.30pm.

Tom and Jack working the apple press

Children queued up to have a turn at making juice with the apple press, using up about 10 big bucketfuls of apples. The apple juice was quite tasty and not too sweet because there were no additives. The remains of the crushed apples get fed to the pigs. There was apple bobbing and a similar game where you had to use your teeth to take an apple from a string blindfolded.

There was also plenty of activity in the pumpkin carving zone, while a competition to see who could make the longest apple peel resulted in a winning peel that was about a metre long. Some of the families that came on Saturday had not been before, so it was good to see people walking about and exploring what could be found on the farm.

Joe, 30/10/10

As always there are a lot of things going in South West Bath. In Twerton High Street the Time Bank is doing well with its new Creative Writing Group. Most of the members are local and they are really enjoying the group. The Time Bank is also preparing to set up a Knit and Natter Group at Twerton. To find out more about the Time Bank visit the website here.

Meanwhile the RNID Centre at Watery Lane is looking for volunteers to help run a coffee shop on site. If you would like to get involved, give the centre a call on 01225 332818.

The Southside Youth and Community Centre, located at Poolemead Road and Kelston View, is undergoing a major revamp. It will open in the spring with a range of world class facilities for communities. The young people are meeting in the cabin pictured below at these times.

The young people said that a gym would be a valuable addition to the Southside Centre and a group of them visited a Shokk Gym in Plymouth to find out more. You can see a designer's impression of how the gym at Southside will look here.

Earlier this year young people at Whiteway organised a series of charity football matches to raise money for new goalposts to be installed in Rosewarn Field. You can see a photo of one of the goals here. Also at Whiteway, some young people have formed a Football Group, Gardening Group and Drama Group. A short video about these developments can be seen here.

In Southdown an Autumn Fayre will be held at St Barnabas Church Hall, across the road from Roundhill, on Saturday 6th November. It will run from 12 noon.

Joe, 26/10/10

Thanks to Mr John Rawlings for sending in this 1910 image of W. R. Cook's factory in Twerton. This would have been one of the last buildings that you passed on the Lower Bristol Road if you were travelling out towards Newton St Loe. The factory and the Carr mills (to the left in the photo) were textile manufacturers and were once big employers of Twerton folk.

To see what Cook's factory was like inside, click here.

In our Memories of Twerton collection, one individual remembers this: "I had a brother who worked over W. R. Cook's factory on the Lower Bristol Road, right opposite the start of Carrs Wood. They used to make quite high class suits. He had to go to work tidy, so when he bought a new suit I used to take on the old one (Alfie, born 1913)." The buildings were demolished in 1964.

Photo by John Rawlings, 22/10/10

On Wednesday evening a second public consultation on the proposed closure of Culverhay School was held at the Guildhall. Tony Parker again presented the Council's case for closing Culverhay based partly on raising grades and using resources to generate a greater range of choice and options in secondary schools.

Head boy James Enyon spoke in favour of keeping the school open, saying that he had found Culverhay to be unlike the negative perceptions that some people have of it, and that the quality of education had caused him to realise his potential. Councillor Gerry Curran spoke of the damage that would be done to the community by closing Culverhay and urged the Council to consider the proposal to turn this school into a high performing academy.

There was concern from residents over the impact of uprooting boys from their school and friends, breaking them off from the teachers who have built up relationships of trust with them, and sending them to schools far from where they live - with some pupils to be taught in portacabins. How will this affect their life chances? Later there were assurances that the Council will try to move these pupils to the school of their choice and with some of their friends.

Tony Parker was questioned on his use of data and accepted that his argument boiled down to Culverhay falling behind other schools in maths and english. But Mr Parker seemed unable to show convincingly that this disparity is due to poor educational provision rather than background factors in the community. Culverhay does well in other subjects.

Near the end of the meeting there were still more residents with questions to ask, so Councillor Paul Crossley asked for the meeting to be extended. The request was refused and many people walked out of the room at this point. Culverhay School has produced its own document responding the Council's consultation document. You can download it here.

Joe, 22/10/10