Monthly Archives: March 2010

Kingsway Business Park – For Gods Sake Come to Rochdale

By 6 commentsRides, Tat

Nice Ride, Shame About the Emptiness

Last weekend, we had a family ride around the bike paths that encircle and crisscross Kingsway Business Park, which is apparently

one of the biggest, highest quality and most strategically important new commercial property developments of its kind in the UK.

This quote, of course, is taken the official website of the development.  In truth (and this is just my opinion for legal reasons) the development is a sad white elephant and a shameful reflection of how bad governance can render a fantastic idea useless.

On the one hand, you’d think that combining the North West Regional Development Agency, Rochdale Council, Rochdale Development Agency and private developers would be a powerful mix.  On the other hand, a committee approach to the development seems to have produced a vast, flattened landscape bisected by excellent roads and wonderful cycle paths.  The vital ingredient seems to be missing…

Where Are The Bloody Businesses?

From what I can gather, planning the Business Park took years longer than was anticipated.  Throughout 20 years of a constantly-growing economy, Rochdale Councillors and regional groups debated the best way of moving the development forwards.  Years passed.  Tree-hugging sandal-wearers fought the cause for the local wildlife because, seemingly, the poorly-draining farmland was a haven for some creatures that liked living in boggy fields.  Years passed…

Then, eventually, work began.  Roads were built.  houses were bulldozed.  Listed buildings were compulsoriuly purchased at great expense.  The one which was earmarked to be the new pub in the middle of the Business Park was, last weekend, partially burnt down by vandals because of course it’s still empty.

Then, with perfectly ironic timing, the economy crashed.  Businesses either stopped expanding, or reined-in spending either to protect themselves from the new risks, or because they couldn’t get mortgages against new property.  Foreign businesses stopped looking to move into the UK… the global business outlook grew dim.  Kingsway Business Park was all dressed up, with nowhere to go and almost nobody to move in.

Green Shoots

In fairness, there’s a small cluster of a few buildings alongside the motorway at the Minrow end of the development.  I sincerely hope we’ll see someone else move in soon.  It’s strangely saddening to be able to enjoy quiet cycle paths intersecting the former farmland between Milnrow and Oldham Road: an expanse of short grass and compacted rubble where formerly cattle roamed and houses stood.

For once, I’m not that grateful for the unbroken great outdoors.  Rochdale needs the jobs; our kids need the prospects.

Road To Nowhere?

But for now, my kids love the traffic-free fun and openness.  Every cloud, I suppose….

Goodbye Old Friend

By 6 commentsRides,

A New Life For My Old Haro

My beloved Haro Escape 7.0 2000 - off to pastures new

Goodbye Old Friend – You’ll be Sorely Missed

It is with some regret that I’ll be rehoming my Haro tonight.  After almost 10 years of loyal service including two Manchester to Blackpools and two Over the Edges, my trusty chrome and blue steed is being collected later to be given a new life in the moors just outside Rochdale.

With forks showing their age; a front mech devoid of fine adjustment capbility due to too many times crammed into sheds and squeezed onto bike racks; untrue-able wheels and an ageing bottom bracket, it’s definitely time that she was put out to grass.

Her new owner has promised her lots of fresh air, good clean mud and a new life as a single speed fixed fork hack.  I think she’s going to love it.  I just hope Jon doesn’t break her as often as he seems to break his main ride!  Oh and Jon, don’t forget to fit a saddle or you’ll be redefining the term “fun bike” 😉

Goodbye Old Friend.  Enjoy your new life in the hills.

*sob, sob, sniff*

My Phone Died – Backup Tools For Windows Mobile

By 10 commentsReviews, ,

Aaaaaaaaaaaarrrrggghh!

Yesterday my phone, with no respect for the faith I have showed in it, collapsed. As I worked quietly away at my desk, it shut itself down, then got half way through starting itself back up before giving up.

This cardboard was more useful than my HTC HD2 yesterday

The screen I actually saw was less useful than this.

Following 10 minutes or so of incredulous ranting, I gathered my thoughts and considered my options.  I had one, really: a full reset and rebuild.  At this point I was very grateful for the backup utilities I’ve been using.

Backup Tools For Windows Mobile

Microsoft have developed a rather excellent little mobile phone backup utility for WinMob phones.  Microsoft My Phone is a free tool, capable of backing up your whole phone contents except software.  I’d recommend it for all WinMob users, because it can even backup your music and photos, whether on the storage card or on the phone memory.  It also keeps all your SMS & MMS  messages, which can be an absolute boon if you need to keep records of some of your text conversations.  If you don’t often take your personal files off the phone (which I do but you might not), this might be the only place you can find them if your phone gets nicked.

At work we run Exchange Server, so we use Activesync to make sure our phones are up to date with all emails; contacts; appointments; tasks and so on.  Since the two tools are both Microsoft, they make sure they don’t rip on each others’ toes so duplicates are avoided.

Success!

Thanks to having already used these two utilities, I managed to repopulate my phone with all the information that was on it before it had a wobbly.  Using the My Phone tool, I archived 2000 texts to the web, thus avoiding the memory problems that probably caused the meltdown in the first place.

Don’t Lose Your Software

A word to the wise…. if you install 3rd party software on your Windows Mobile device, keep the Registration Keys on record.  If (when?) you have to rebuild the phone, the software will be lost along with all other data held on the handset.  If you’re working from the storage card, that should be ok but don’t leave it to chance.

I’ve had to reinstall 2 pieces of software and have needed to punch in the Product Registration Keys for both of them.  In the worst case, you might have to pay again to use something you’ve already paid for.  Don’t get caught out.

Now What?

After an hour or so wasted rebuilding my little friend, I’ve calmed down a bit.  I think I’m ready for the abusive comments from iPhone users now 😉

Rib Recovery Ride

By 9 commentsReviews, Rides, ,

Stir Crazy After All These Beers

Owing to increasing, recurrent pain in my ribs following a knock at football, I’ve avoided exercise for a couple of weeks.  I’d noticed that the pain was subsiding nicely, which is good, but my energy levels were subsiding too, which is bad news.

On Friday I went out for a meal with my colleagues at San Carlo in Manchester which was beautiful (try the lobster risotto) and retuned home where I had a couple of beers to supplement the mucho vino that had accompanied the meal.  Saturday followed, which consisted of a quiet day in, a Not Poodle for lunch and Phase3 of the Magnolia Replacement Programme (downstairs bathroom painted).  I can’t stand the rain, against my window, bringing back sweet memories, so I became steadily more stir crazy as the day went on.

Saturday evening, therefore, consisted of a pasta meal at Pizza Hut with (guess what?) a beer, then a visit to the Odeon to take in Alice In Wonderland in 3D.

Movie Review, Alice In Wonderland 3D

It’s ok. Not as good as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, but worth seeing if you like Tim Burton stuff.

Back To The Point…

By Sunday morning my lethargy was becoming a habit.  Too much food, too many alcoholic beverages, not enough fresh air.  So, we agreed that despite the day’s necessary visiting and a quick trip to Decathlon to eye up SPD shoes (nowt good going), we would get out for a brief ride to see how my ribs would hold out.

Hurrah!

I’m chuffed to say that a few gentle miles was just what the doctor ordered.  There has been no pain whatsoever so I reckon I’m good to get a few more miles in before I get back on the treadmill to see how my lungbox responds to some slightly less gentle jigging about.

We rode on the very well appointed bike paths around the shameful white elephant that is Kingsway Business Park.  It took Rochdale 20 years to pass the idea and by the time they’d put the infrastructure into the area, a combination of loss of momentum and a crashing economy has left the place largely empty.  It’s a crying shame and I genuinely hope that business will come to the area when the economy starts to recover.  Rochdale needs the jobs and the access to the site is very good.

Wheeeeee! Like my new top from Decathlon?

Our riding Decathlon advertisement!

But for now, we managed to scoot around traffic-free bike paths savouring the quiet and the views before pootling back along the canalside home.  It was a nice reintroduction to my lovely bike after a few weeks of enforced rest.

New GPS Tracker

I downloaded a new GPS Tracker last week.  So far I’m very happy with the way it works and there’s some free PC software that can be used to compare & score rides, runs and so on by various criteria.  It’s a handy little app for my phone.  But the catch at the moment is that it uses a little text file to store the waypoints so to upload it to MapMyRides I have to go via Google Earth and save the file as a kml, which is a pain in the bum.  I don’t much like Google Earth, so I’d prefer to avoid it.  I’ll keep tinkering and see how I get on.  Anyway, here’s yesterday’s ride – it looks like it’s across fields but that’s just because the paths weren’t built when the Google plane flew over.

Woohoo! I Won Wiggle!

By 12 commentsRides,

And The Winner Is … Me

If, like me, you habitually and/or compulsively keep buying things off’ve the internet, you probably get asked to submit reviews quite a lot.  Recently, the lovely people at Wiggle sent me an email to tell me that if I sent a review for my new bike, they’d enter me in some prize draw or another.  I kinda skipped the “prize draw” stuffed to be honest, thinking that it’d be a good thing to just submit the review as I like to check other people’s reviews on the Wiggle site.

Well, a couple of days ago I got an email from Jason at Wiggle, telling me I’d won a prize.  Woohoo! I was very chuffed indeed.  I phoned the guy up, gave him the usual “I never win anything, I’m so surprised etc. etc.” guff and then emailed a few lines as requested.  The lovely Wiggle people have blogged about it here, as they wanted to make it clear that Wiggle shoppers win Wiggle prizes.

So, I’m looking forward to receiving my lovely new set of lights.  I don’t actually need them, but I’m sure they’ll be used because they’re bound to better than at least one of the 7 sets of lights we’ve already got for our 5 bikes.  Maybe I should run my own “win a set of lights” competition on this newly-renamed Phill’s Irregular Cycles blog.

I won these lights, hurrah!

My shiny new free lights

What do you think?

p.s.  I haven’t hyperlinked Wiggle here, you may have noticed.  If you want to see their site, go to Joby’s splendid Fight Bad Driving site and follow his affiliate link. He needs the money.

p.p.s.  In “Other News“, I’ve been asked to be a guest blogger on an American diet site.  I’ll tell you all about that soon, as I may need to ask for some help…

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