“Following a number of recent robberies in the Stokes Croft and
Montpelier areas and in response to requests from Montpelier residents
to address some ongoing issues in the neighbourhood, a meeting has been
scheduled for Wednesday 23rd May 2012 between 6.30pm and 8.30pm at the
Salvation Army on Ashley Road.

This meeting will be about anti-social behaviour, waste, street
cleansing, dog mess, substance abuse and crime problems that are
impacting in Montpelier. The recent robberies will be the focus of this
meeting, but within the context of these other issues.

Also, some residents are in the process of putting together a Montpelier
Residents’ Association to feed these and other issues into the Ashley
Neighbourhood Forum. The meeting will provide an opportunity to explore
this idea, get involved and support the development of this group.

If these issues are important to you, please come along and have your say.

Please also share this with anyone who lives in or around Montpelier.

Kind Regards,

Richard Orna
Ashley Neighbourhood Forum Support”

The Park Group have also just installed a green roof on their new community toolshed (where the telephone box used to be).  They have a variety of tools available for borrowing, including spades, forks, shears, long-handled secateurs, rakes, a mattock, a bowsaw and a water carrier.  They also have a boules set, a 3x3m gazebo, a table tennis set and a first aid kit.

If you would like to borrow any of these items, please get in touch with Alan Russell on 0117 942 0977 or 0797 493 7204, or knock on his door at 1A St Andrew’s Road.

• 2 folding trestle tables
• a 3x3m gazebo
• a chalkboard
• a large soft groundsheet (kids activites etc)
• an A3 laminator + pouches
• a cashbox
• a projector
• 5 x 20m lengths of bunting
• 3 insulation models (cavity, internal, external)
• 2 flipcharts + pens
• Scrapstore membership
• 50L waterhog for moving tapwater

Contact admin@transitionmontpelier.org.uk for more info.

So, we’re starting a group to focus on how to help tenants save energy.  This group could do anything from pulling together the correct information on grants and funding for landlords, preparing for the Green Deal, giving away free draught excluder packs or working to secure grants for energy efficiency work.  There’s power in numbers; what’s your landlord doing to help you cut your energy bills?  What could Transition Montpelier do to help?

Whether you are in private rented, housing association or BCC accommodation, short- or long-term lets, get in touch by emailing energy@transitionmontpelier.org.uk if you’d like to get involved.  Or come along to our Open Meeting on May 10th, 7.30pm in the basement of Cafe Kino.

We’ll also be able to try out the lovely new community gardening tools that the Park Group have just bought, and will be keeping in their lockable bunker where the telephone box used to be.  All welcome – hope to see you there!

You can download a summary of this work here.  Videos and reports on housing types are here.

For us, the conclusions point to four main community projects over the coming years:

• mass top-up of loft insulation
• mass installation of solid wall insulation
• mass improvement/community bulk-buy of heating controls
• community bulk-buy purchase of solar PV panels.

84% of our homes are ‘hard to treat’ for energy efficiency, and could qualify for Energy Company Obligation (ECO) grant subsidies for solid wall insulation and gas condensing boilers as part of the proposed Green Deal.  This is relevant for homeowners, but is particularly important for the 28% of homes here that are privately rented, as it has the potential to allow retrofitting work to occur with no upfront cost to the landlord, and give cheaper bills and warmer homes for the tenants.  It is not yet clear how ECO grants will function in the LA/housing association sector, but we aim to work closely with this sector as 44% of Montpelier homes are social housing of some form.

The main reports are over 300 pages long, and due to the nature of some of the analyses, can’t be hosted on a public server – they contain information on which properties would be best to target for solid wall insulation and solar PV panels, and could be used by unscrupulous salespeople to target vulnerable homes. We are happy to share these with interested residents; please email energy@transitionmontpelier.org.uk if you would like to see more.

The CSE reports and analyses give us the first step for securing substantial grants for community work to tackle wide-scale change to the housing stock here.   If you’d like to get involved in the next phase of our work, we are holding an Open Meeting on 10 May in the basement of Cafe Kino at 7.30pm.  Hope to see you there.

Have you ever wondered what you could do to make your home more energy efficient and reduce your energy bills?  One hundred homes in Montpelier received an EPC report from Rob Daniel of Shine Energy Services; he tells us what he learned about Montpelier:

We also commissioned Parity Projects to conduct Home Energy Masterplan surveys on four Montpelier properties – two in Upper Montpelier and two in Lower Montpelier.

Whether you you’re planning a refurbishment project, want to understand the steps you can take to reduce your home’s impacts on the environment, or simply want a house that is warmer and cheaper to run, a survey provides very detailed, individually tailored advice on the steps you can take.  It takes into account a property’s physical aspects, and also the way it is used and any plans for improvement. Reports cover everything from insulation and efficient heating, through to lifestyle changes, appliance use and the potential to harness renewable energy.  There are many different providers of depth energy surveys, and each offers slightly different things.

Measures recommended for properties in Montpelier range from the installation of central heating thermostats and the replacement of incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) in the low-cost / ‘No Brainer’ category, through to solid wall installation and solar PV costing several thousand pounds in the ‘Green Halo + PV’ category.

With agreement from the Montpelier residents we visited, we’re able to make the in depth reports available for everyone to read. To find out more, choose which property is most similar to your own home and click on the link below.

2 Storey Victorian Terrace with Loft Conversion – Lower Montpelier

3 Storey Victorian Terrace – Lower Montpelier

3 Storey Georgian Terrace – Upper Montpelier

3 Storey Victorian End Terrace – Upper Montpelier

We also talked to Hamish Cormack of The Positive Choice who carried out the surveys on behalf of Parity.  Take a look at the short videos which complement the surveys and highlight some key considerations for home energy efficiency.

Victorian Terrace with Loft Conversion, Lower Montpelier

Victorian Terrace, Lower Montpelier

Georgian Terrace, Upper Montpelier

Transition Montpelier presents the Home Energy Fair: Saturday 14 April, 2-5pm at the Old Fairfield School on Fairfield Road in Montpelier. Our full programme for the day is here

We’ll have talks and demonstrations galore: from to how to fit draught excluders to what the Green Deal’s all about.  There’s a whole room full of Montpelier contractors (your neighbours: there’s LOADS of them working in energy efficiency!) ready to give you advice on everything from refurbishing sash windows to solar hot water.   You’ll also be able to hear what Transition Montpelier has been learning about Montpelier homes and what we can do individually and together to Keep Warm and Save Money.  There will be kids activities, food, hundreds of juicy giveaways and space to enjoy an April Saturday afternoon with friends.

Full details of our interactive workshops are in the programme, and you can sign up for them here.

We need volunteers to help out on the day. If you have a spare  half an hour or so, all hands are very welcome.  You can email homeenergyfair@gmail.com with any questions or suggestions.  And huge thanks to Alex Lucas for our lovely poster!

DRAUGHTPROOFING:

CSE’s (The Centre for Sustainable Energy) is a national charity that helps people change the way they think and act on energy. CSE are running a hands on draught proofing workshop which provides information on the main techniques and materials to use to draught proof their homes. Whether your a home owner or a renter come along and learn about ways to keep you, your friends and your family warm. Sign up if you would like to join in: homeenergyfair@gmail.com

HOME INSULATION:

MakeyourhomeEco, a local community energy initiative, are offering The Ins and Outs of Home Insulation, with a wide range of samples to compare and contrast.

ECOGADGETS:

Can Ecogadgets help you save carbon and money at home? MakeyourhomeEco are also offering a rummage through a selection of gadgets to explore which ones are worth it for the way you live.  Sign up for more info on either: homeenergyfair@gmail.com

TENANT’S ENERGY UNION:

Do you want to persuade your landlord or housing association to improve the energy efficiency of your home, and cut your energy bills?  This group is aimed at getting a project started.  There are grants and tax breaks available to landlords, and some research on the benefits of energy efficiency work for landlords. There are landlords willing to do things, but without the time to find out how.  There are grants out there that we could get to help subsidise some work. Could we pull something together to help make rented homes in Montpelier more energy efficient?  Sign up for more info: homeenergyfair@gmail.com