Resurfacing Bluntisham Community Car Park

Bluntisham Community car park (///files.recapture.shady) is in a poor state of repair and needs much needed maintenance. It's used by parents and visitors to the school and pre-school, local football clubs, dog walkers, dance groups, cricketers, beer festers and many more who enjoy the village's recreational facilities.

The land is owned by Cambridgeshire County Council and was leased by Bluntisham Parish Council up until 2012. The Parish Council gave up the lease due to an increase in rent by CCC.

In 2013, St Helen's Primary school agreed to take on the lease to secure the car park for the community. CCC agreed to the school leasing the car park for a nominal rent in order to keep it as an asset for the community and for parents and carers to park to reduce congestion of the road.

As has been well publicised in the media in recent months, school budgets do not stretch to the re-surfacing of this kind of community asset, nor can St Helen's assign educational funds to it. We rely on donations of plainings when CCC have a highways team nearby, and then the generosity of staff, friends and family of the school to come to spread them out. The school have been investigating low-cost, safe and appropriate resurfacing options but, with the lowest quote so far at £30,000, we are unlikely to be doing the work in the short term. We are continuously looking for and applying for grants, but many are not applicable (as it's a car park) or are simply not enough to carry out the work.

As the car park is used by so many, and in order to move forward with a solution, we have set up this Go Fund Me page to encourage all those that use the car park to consider donating to the upkeep. This money will be held ring-fenced securely in the school's bank account following all necessary financial standards until we have enough money to move forward. The hope is that we:

1. short term - can get a large deposit of road plainings and secure the hire/use of a vehicle to spread the plaining.

2. long term - appoint a contractor to install a harder wearing/longer lasting surface for the car park.

In the meantime, we will continue to request plainings from CCC and to do our best to maintain the car park in the best way we can.

If you are connected to the building industry, in particular surfacing and have a contact you can pass on, please do contact the school. Our contact details are on Go Fund Me and on our school website.