Council spending £1k to celebrate opening of new footpath

Planned footpath from Sparrows Herne to Club Kingswood’s car park in Basildon
-Credit: (Image: Basildon Council)


Plans are being drawn up for a £1,000 celebration ceremony for a new footpath, which will cost more than £25,000. The path will link a busy town’s road to a gym as part of proposals to spend more than £36,000 on community projects.

Basildon Council’s Westley Heights Area Committee is set to agree to the funding for the new Lady Basildon Path, which would run from Sparrows Herne to Club Kingswood’s car park and would run parallel to Clayhill Lane along the edge of the hedge line within the open space. The meeting agenda documents show it would be a “new granite dust footpath”, and the cost rundown is £25,754.30 for the footpath and £1,000 for the topping out ceremony - a celebration of construction being completed.

It’s part of plans to spend £36,833 on projects in the Westley Heights Area of Basildon. This includes £1,500 of investment in the delivery of the Crunch service, a waste collection service. There is also set to be £3,000 spent on a Christmas switch at an event with music and a lit Christmas tree.

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The funding pot being considered also includes £557.08 of investment for providing four salt bins, £2,500 of funding to be awarded to Basildon Helping Hands Foodbank and £2,500 of funding for Langdon Hills Estate Residents Association.

The meeting agenda papers said: “The proposal is to award funding of £2,500 to Basildon Helping Hands Food Bank to commission winter food parcels for residents in the Nethermayne and Langdon Hills Wards. Each food parcel would provide food for three to seven days.

“The proposal is to award funding of £2,500 to The Langdon Hills Estate Residents Association to support their winter relief project. The Area Committee are asked to consider allocating £557.08 for the provision of four salt bins across the Nethermayne and Langdon Hills Wards. The cost is for a 90-litre plastic salt bin with a lid, including ground fixings. These bins are compact and ideal for footpaths and roadsides. They have a robust double-skinned lid, and their durable construction means that they are designed to withstand extreme weather conditions while requiring minimal maintenance.”