The Friends of Quarry

A Thursday Lunch Club aims to provide a two course home cooked lunch for older people who live alone in the Headington area. It takes place on the 1st and 3rd Thursdays of the month in Corpus Christi Church Hall, Margaret Road. Before lunch, from about 12.30 guests are served drinks and nibbles, lunch is served at 1pm and after lunch there is tea or coffee and chocolates. More details are on the HTHQ website.

Headington Quarry Morris Dancers will be holding their traditional Mummers Play on Boxing Day, 27 December, this year. Times will be confirmed in due course. Photos and details of previous events are on their website.

Local resident Maurice East will be holding a Boxing Day walking tour of Quarry, including the Pubs, pits, wells, Romans and Roughs.

The tour is free, but to control numbers, please order a ticket via Eventbrite.

The minutes of the 2020 AGM and accounts for 2021 are now available to view.

Headington Action will be marking the start of the Christmas and Winter holiday by turning the Christmas lights on on 4 December. The timetable for events on the day are:

0900 – 1400: The Saturday Market with festive food and crafts.  

1630 – 1730 Christmas tree Lights switch-on with:

• Mince pies, wine and soft drinks provided by Headington  Action and local businesses. 

• Countdown to switch on by the Lord Mayor of Oxford

• Community singing round the tree. 

Headington Action organises the Christmas tree and the lights in the  permanent trees. It thanks councillors and local businesses for their donations.

Please note that there will be an additional Headington Market on 22 December.

More details are available on the Headington Action poster.

Friends of Quarry are celebrating the 50th year of the establishment of the Conservation Area in 1971. To celebrate this, the illustrations on the 1971 leaflet, which was produced by the City Council, and describes the reasons for founding of the Conservation Area, are being used as the front and back pages of our Autumn newsletter. The Conservation Area leaflet is also on our website.

In that leaflet the Council described the principles of conservation to be used which included:

1. The Council will use their powers under the relevant Acts to ensure that the character of the area is maintained.
2. Where new development is involved, the scale of the new buildings and material used, shall be sympathetic, and in keeping, with the existing development.
3. Where change is considered necessary, it should be carried out by adapting existing buildings (with possible exceptions) in a manner which will be in keeping with the scale, materials and character of the area.

Friends of Quarry have worked with the Council to apply these and other principles to the development within Quarry over the last fifty years. This approach has generally worked well but as explained in the last newsletter we have had our differences with the City Planners over the egregious development at 1 Quarry High Street.

Following two years of intensive lobbying and discussions of this development the Planners have accepted that what is built does not accurately reflect what was proposed in the original application. Following our persistent representations, they have asked for a retrospective planning application and if this is not forthcoming have indicated that they will then take appropriate enforcement action.

We were also heavily involved in the campaign to prevent the installation of a 20m high 5G mast at the entrance to Quarry. Planning permission for the mast was eventually refused. These cases highlight both the need for careful scrutiny of planning applications within Quarry and the need for an organization like Friends of Quarry.

If you are interested in protecting the character of the conservation area, please consider joining the Friends of Quarry and joining the committee.

Owing to the high infection rates of covid at present we have decided to have the AGM on line again. It will be on Monday 22nd November at 7:30pm. A Google Meet link will be sent out closer to the time.

The major agenda items are to elect a new treasurer and co-ordinator and confirm the committee members who wish to continue. Anyone interested in joining the committee can be voted onto it during the AGM.

The Treasurer’s and Co-ordinator’s report will be presented.

Please remember that you need to be a member of FOQ to vote at the AGM. All annual membership fees are due in November. Details of how to pay and how to contact us with any queries are on our website.

Holy Trinity are holding a series of Teatime Recitals during November. They will take place at 1500 in the Church on the following days:

Saturday 6th November, 3pm: Dominic Scott (Piano), Laura Biron-Scott (Clarinet).
Saturday 13th November, 3pm: Quarry Wind Quintet (debut performance!)
Saturday 20th November, 3pm: Rosie Tweddle (Organ)
Saturday 27th November, 3pm: Dvorak Wind Serenade, with members of the Oxford Sinfonia.

They are free, with a retiring collection to raise money for the church building fund.

Each recital will be followed by refreshments in church. More details are available on the Holy Trinity Website

Headington Action are encouraging residents to light up Headington’s residential streets through November, December and into early January.

To encourage you, a free set of LED battery lights (with batteries included) can be obtained by emailing them.

More information is available on their poster.