CALENDAR FEBRUARY

TK Food group meeting. Wed 6th Feb, 7.30-9.30, (email for address).

TK stall at Keynsham Farmers Market (& Bike maintenance). Sat 9th Feb, 9.00-13.00

TK Community Rubbish Pick. Sun 10th Feb, 11.00-1.00, meet in gravel carpark by Lock

Keeper.

Stitch 'n' Bitch Group. Wed 13th Feb, 7.30-9.30pm (Erica’s home, email for add)

Film Showing: ‘Fracking Hell’ & ‘The Sky is Pink’. Thurs 14th Feb, 7.15pm doors open, Plus

Valentine’s Day themed tea & cake until 9.30pm.

MARCH Plot in the Park ~ Next Dig in! Sat 2nd March, 10.30am-12.30pm.

TK R3 Group meeting. Mon 11th March, 1.00pm, back room of Ship Inn.

ONGOING Informal cycling socials: 1st Sat and 3rd Sunday of the month

Womble Litter Picks: Wherever, whenever, whoever! - Click to download a sign up flyer.

Transition Keynsham January Newsletter

keynshamt@yahoo.co.uk 07970737760

Find us on Twitter @TransitionKsham

Join our Facebook Group

1) Transition Keynsham’s achievements in 2012

TK energy group

Close the door campaign – Members of the group asked local shop keepers to keep their doors closed

during opening hours, particularly shops which have their heating on. Keeping heat in the shop reduces the

businesses energy bill, reduces running costs and keeps both employees and customers work. Iceland has

made their door sensor less sensitive so does not open for just people walking past.

Hydro project – The group has been looking into the option of producing hydroelectric power in the town. A

report was published in the summer which gave a suggested location at the Keynsham Weir. A lot of positive

support for the project has been given both from the community and council and this will be moved forward

during 2013.

Iford Manor visit – A visit to see the hydroelectric generator at Iford manor was arranged in the summer. 14

people attended a very useful and informative Sunday afternoon in the sunshine which gave us the

opportunity to see at first hand a hydro scheme working. Members from the Bathford energy group and

Transition Bath also attended.

Town Energy Plan – With Keynsham having a number of new developments over the next few years (town

centre, K2, Somerdale and Riverside) the group have produced an initial idea of connecting possible

renewable energy sources within the town. This will be developed further in 2013.

Keynsham food festival 2012 – We had a stall at the annual Keynsham Food Festival in which we presented

our hydro project and also the group’s ideas for a town energy plan. The stall was very busy for most of the

morning and a number of people were keen to find out more about the energy group and our projects.

News 1. Transition Keynsham’s

Achievements in 2012.

2. Fundraising.

3. Craft Co-operative

4. Frack Free February

5. Community Rubbish Pick

6. Lucy’s New Yoga class!

7. Kerbside collection of small

electrical items.

CBM Meeting – The group presented its hydro project and town plan at the Coal Bed Methane meeting in

October 2012 to over 90 members of the community. This was in support of Frack Free Somerset to give

alternative, renewable ideas for a more sustainable future. Alternative to fossil fuels and natural gas is

possible!

Energy advice – The group was invited to give energy advice to local community groups, St. Francis Church

and community@67. Both groups were very grateful for the expert advice given by our members and St.

Francis Church is looking to implement some of our suggestions.

November open meeting – The TK energy group November meeting was an open meeting held at St. Francis

Church Hall. A number of councillors and church members were in attendance to hear some excellent

presentations by guess speakers Derek Quilter and David Martin. Further open meetings will be held in 2013.

Greendoors open home event – Mary and David Lambert opened their home for the weekend and provided

tours for several visitors as part of the Green Doors weekend. It provided those with a keen interest to see

and learn about the extensive work and technologies that help homes to be more energy efficient from

production of renewable energy to retrofitting properties to stop energy being wasted.

The TK energy group would like to thank everyone who has helped in the events and projects during 2012 and look

forward to a productive and successful 2013. Please keep an eye on our web pages for future events, project updates

and energy saving tips. Anyone wishing to get involved or would like to find out more please contact

Mark Penny at thegulls567@yahoo.co.uk

TK food group With the help of a large amount of hardworking volunteers we transformed a boring patch of grass into a

thriving haven for bees and butterflies at the Manor Rd wildflower patch. It went on to win a silver medal

and recognition in the South West in Bloom competition for ‘improving the neighbourhood’.

We said goodbye to our community vegetable patch at the Clock Tower to make way for the redevelopment

and said hello to our new veggie ‘Plot in the Park’, next to the café in Keynsham Memorial park. We hope to

get lots of people involved in our monthly ‘Dig-in’ workdays at the plot to help us grow lots of lovely

vegetables and fruit. It is a substantial plot with a prime location for teaching and inspiring people (especially

children) in Keynsham how to grow and enjoy locally grown food.

We continue to pair people up through TK’s ‘Garden Share Scheme’, matching those who want to grow but

have no land with people with spare garden space. It is a win-win arrangement with the garden owners

getting a small share of the produce as well as the grower who gets access to land and avoids having to join a

lengthy allotment waiting list!

We collected and saved seed from our Manor Rd wildflower patch and ran a seed-bomb making workshop at

Community @67. These bombs help to spread the beauty and biodiversity far across Keynsham and beyond.

It was also a great excuse to have fun playing with soil! We hope the seed bombs made snazzy and unusual

Christmas presents and the donations given will be used to further Transition projects.

Andrew Gallop, a local Bushcraft enthusiast, organised a couple of food foraging walks around Keynsham’s

local countryside. Introducing people to hidden edible gems right in our backyards.

We maintained the guerrilla patch at Downfields and we hope it continues to be a talking point for the

children and their families who live nearby and the Wansdyke Play Rangers that use the park every

Wednesday. I’m sure they will be looking forward to the strawberries ripening again.

We started to organise a community apple pressing event which unfortunately had to be put on hold due to

a terrible apple growing season. Hopefully we shall have better luck this year!

TK R3 group (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle) We organised a successful community rubbish pick around the Lockkeeper area. A huge amount of waste

was collected due to the efforts of a team of volunteers over just a couple of hours. Tens of brimming bin

liners full of rubbish avoided washing down stream and out to sea because of the litter pick that day.

Inspired by the enthusiasm of local volunteers Erica of the R3 group created the ‘Transition Keynsham

Wombles’ project. Already many residents in Keynsham, young & retired, big & small, have signed up to be a

Womble, pledging to regularly litter pick an area close to where they live. The R3 group was given a small

amount of funding which enabled Erica to purchase litter picking equipment to make the job a little easier.

The Co-operative recognised the community benefit of such a worthwhile venture and awarded the

Keynsham Wombles with a seasonal party pack and £100 worth of vouchers to spend on party food.

The R3 group also continue to fundraise for their re-usable bag project.

Stitch and Bitch group At the beginning of 2012 Shelley O’Regan ran a series of patchwork workshops at her home, teaching people

how to design and fabricate their own patchwork creations. We also raffled off one of Shelley’s gorgeous

homemade quilts to raise funds for TK.

Several members of the Stitch and Bitch group took part in a jubilee celebration Yarn Bombing – Knitted

Bunting project at the Bath Fashion Museum, knitting hundreds of coloured triangles.

Jill and Erica also made some beautifully knitted flowers and vines to decorate the backdrop of our new plot

in the park. Unfortunately these disappeared overnight. We just hope that whoever has them now

appreciates them just as much as we did!

With her new found confidence and skills picked up at the Stitch & Bitch group Monica set up her own craft

enterprise, creating beautiful handmade gifts; http://casalolasblog.blogspot.co.uk/.

Other Transition activities Transition Keynsham showed a number of informative and thought-provoking environmental and social

justice films throughout the year including; Gasland, Earth Pilgrim, Who Killed the Electric Car, Blue-Gold -

World Water Wars, Black Gold, Juliette of the Herbs, In Transition and many more. We probably also ate our

body weight in cake after the films!

Despite the wind, rain and cold we held a stall at every Keynsham Farmers Market, providing free bicycle

maintenance advice for anyone who needed it.

At the Keynsham Music festival we enticed festival goers to pedal our bicycle powered smoothie maker to

whizz up their own delicious fairtrade banana and strawberry smoothie. Yum! Children also got the

opportunity to meet our very own litter-picking Orinoco Womble and parents could buy tickets for our good

food hamper, full of homemade, locally produced or fairly traded treats.

Our stall at the Victorian Evening was the best yet; it displayed an array of attractive Christmas gifts from

homemade fudge, bunting, wooden egg cups, dolls bedding to seed bombs! As well as the most glittery pixie

cakes on the high street.

Transition Keynsham joined Saltford Environment Group and the Frack Free Somerset Coalition in a

campaign to inform our community about the threat of UK Methane’s coalbed methane application.

Hundreds of people felt informed and empowered enough to fight the application and lodged their

oppositions on the B&NES planning website. This pressure ensured that UK Methane were not able to go

through with their original plans and withdrew their application. They have claimed they will submit a new

application for somewhere in their PED licence and we will be waiting for them. Hopefully the example

Keynsham has set will set precedence and be an inspiration for other communities who will need to fight the

frackers.

We made a lot of cake! In fact we managed to squeeze it in at almost every event we took part in.

We Co-hosted Satish Kumar to come and speak in Keynsham with Churches together and Keynsham Matters.

And are now also involved in the Satish Kumar Legacy group and ‘Live Simply’ project.

We organised monthly informal cycle rides throughout 2012 for keen cyclists to meet and ride together. A

team of these cyclists went on to win the adult team category of the Saltford Cycle Quest.

Transition Keynsham gave several presentations to other community groups in Keynsham to raise awareness

of the possible effects of peak oil and climate change on our community and the wider world and the

motivations behind Transition Towns.

We took part in brilliant interagency gatherings to meet other groups, businesses and organisations that are

doing great things in our community. To form links, share and mutually support each other.

2) Funding Wow, what a year! It just goes to show what can be done with just a little bit of time, energy and enthusiasm!

We would love to continue to do more of the same and help Keynsham’s transition to happier, healthier,

sustainable and resilient future. Our vision would be for more people to get involved and take Transition

Keynsham to the next level, helping us to maintain, grow and create more TK projects and activities.

To make this happen Transition Keynsham needs people and it also really needs some funds. For the last three

years we have been bumbling along without any real focus on fundraising and now the pot has almost run dry.

Every year we spend the following to keep TK core activities running;

£150 for farmers market stalls

£210 public liability insurance

£50 printing

£100 or so on room hire.

Without wanting to quote a multinational company ‘Every Little Helps’ and even a trickle of several income

streams will soon help to fill up the pot again. We have put our heads together and come up with the following ways

that we can raise money:

Sponsored events – Exmouth night cycle ride, dragon boat racing.

Encourage more people to attend events such as TK film showings.

Apply for grants for particular activities such as plot in the park.

Asking for donations for services; such as energy saving or bicycle maintenance advice.

Asking for general donations.

Plant sales.

A co-operative craft stall, either a real-life stall at events or an online store.

Ask for donations – either £, plants, cakes, crafts etc.

Renting equipment – such as projector, P.A.

Organising a swish

Quiz Nights

Fundraising Gig

Bake Off

Curry Safari

Keynsham local food recipe cards.

Open gardens.

If you are interested in helping with any of the above, even in the smallest way, please do get in touch – We’d love to hear from you.

Or if you’d like to make a donation to Transition Keynsham please visit our PayPal donation webpage or

send a cheque for ‘Transition Keynsham’ to 20 Winscombe Close, Keynsham, Bristol, BS31 2HR.

3) Craft Co-operative

4) Frack Free February Now that UK Methane have withdrawn their coalbed methane application from Keynsham Frack Free Somerset is

extending its focus to the wider area that is covered by their PEDL (Petroleum Exploration & Development Licence).

The coalition has organise ‘Frack Free February’ - a Month of Action in Somerset with public meetings, talks, stalls,

workshops, actions and more all raising awareness about the threats to our communities and the bigger picture of

extreme energy.

The Frack Free February Month of Action is an opportunity to:

Systematically raise awareness about fracking & extreme energy to communities at risk in Somerset – we will

be distributing 50,000 leaflets across towns & villages in the PEDL licensed areas

Create a wide variety of opportunities for participation and action to anyone moved by the literature and

outreach activities & the thought of fracking taking place locally – see the list of actions below

To generate momentum for the campaign in 2013 and significantly increase planning application response

capacity across the county e.g. starting more local groups, increasing the number of newsletter sign ups and

so forth, so that when applications are submitted, we can best respond and support each other across the

county.

Lots of people have been starting to make things in Keynsham,

whether this is cushions, doorstops, bunting, jewellery, egg-cups,

artwork etc. We think it is fantastic that people are being creative

and producing locally made goods and we would like to see much

more of it!

Factors that make it hard for people to sell their goods are;

cost of stalls at events, time to make enough stock, time to

manage an online outlet. there have been murmurings within the

Stitch and Bitch group about how to overcome these problems and

the possibility of people getting together to collectively sell their

crafts - either on a joint stall like the monthly craft market at the

Scout Hut, or via an online shop such as Etsy.

Coming together under a Transition Keynsham Craft Co-

operative banner will help people to sell their crafts by sharing the

workload and the rewards and it could also be a little income

stream for TK if a minimal percentage of sales were donated to

Transition Keynsham?

If you are interested and would like to find out more please get in

contact or join us at our next Stitch and Bitch meeting.

Frack Free February Activities in Keynsham

On Saturday 9th February ‘Frack the World Inc.’ street theatre group will be visiting Keynsham High St to raise

awareness of their ambition to Frack the world at all costs.

Thursday 14th February – Transition Keynsham Filmshowing of ‘Fracking Hell’ and the ‘Sky is Pink’. Come

along and join other lovers of clean water at our monthly film showing at Community @67. There will be

Valentine themed cakes for afters and candle-light. What could be more romantic!

Doors open 7.15pm, £3 suggested donation.

We will not be showing Gasland as previously advertised as we cannot afford the Dogwoof licence to show the film publicly.

5) Community Rubbish Pick

Click HERE for details of what else is going on as part of

Frack Free February.

6) Lucy’s New Yoga Classes in Keynsham Thursdays 6-7pm in the Fear Hall. Cost is £6 drop in or £20 for 4 classes.

07852925635 and email lucygoldsack2001@yahoo.co.uk

7) Kerbside collection of small electrical items

NEW small electrical recycling collection starts 18 February 2013

Have you got any small electrical times that are broken or you no longer want?

Starting 18 February if you live in Bath and North East Somerset, you can start recycling

them from home as part of our weekly green box recycling collection service. These items

must be able to fit in an average size plastic carrier bag and will be collected as part of our

weekly green box recycling collection service.

We will collect any small electrical item that has a plug or uses batteries. Suitable items for

collection include:

• Bedside lamps (please remove light bulbs and shades), blenders, kettles, calculators,

cameras, chargers, digi -boxes, electronic toothbrushes, electronic toys and games, hair

straighteners, hi-fi equipment, irons, power tools, remote controls, shavers, telephones,

toasters, torches and so on!

We can’t collect any large item such as:

• No TVs and PC monitors, large printers, fridges and freezers, washing machines,

cookers, microwave ovens, and lawn mowers. These can be recycled but are too big for

this collection, so you still need to take these to your local Recycling Centre instead.

Alternatively, you can book a collection from the Council for a fee.

• No fluorescent tubes and light bulbs

• No items with leaking batteries or broken glass which could harm our crews.

The small electrical items must be put in an untied carrier bag next to your green recycling

box on your usual weekly collection day by 7am. You can put out more than one carrier

bag if necessary. Please remove any batteries first and put these in a small plastic bag at

the top of your green box as usual. We may use different vehicles to pick up your

electricals so don’t worry if your usual recycling has been collected before or after your

electricals.

Please don’t forget to donate any working electricals in reusable condition

to charity if possible.

All the items we collect will be crushed, separated into their different materials and

recycled to make new products. It is a waste to throw these electrical items away because

they can be recycled and made into new things using their valuable metals and plastics -

one clothes iron can provide enough steel to make 13 new steel cans.