VE Day 80 Event in the Hall

UPDATED: A Very big THANK YOU to everyone who joined us at this event.

Langford’s own Thursday Circle is holding a VE Day 80 event in the Hall from 2 to 4pm on Thursday 8th May. Come along and wear your red, white and blue colours for music and a 1940s singalong.

Everyone’s welcome, please just contribute £1 each to help towards the provision of refreshments during the afternoon.

Anyone with questions about this event can also contact Sandra by email (bookings@lvca.org.uk)

County Council Election Result 2025

Nick Cotter has been elected as the new Oxfordshire County Councillor who will represent Langford Village residents and others in Bicester South. This follows the poll held on May 1st.

OCC Election Candidates – May 1st 2025

The candidates standing in the County Council election on May 1st 2025 have now been announced. Langford Village is in the Bicester South ward.

Click here for further details.

New 20mph speed limit gets the go ahead

A new maximum speed limit of 20mph on Langford’s roads will be introduced following a decision taken at Oxfordshire County Council (0CC).

OCC’s Cabinet Member for Transport Management, Councillor Andrew Gant, dismissed objections, including that of the Langford Village Community Association which had submitted evidence to indicate why it considered that the change here was unnecessary..

All Langford’s estate roads, with the exception of part of Gavray Drive, will now become 20mph.

A total of 704 people had responded to the online consultation organised by OCC before the decision to go ahead was taken and 69% of those responding objected to the 20mph plans.

Langford Community Hall To Be Polling Station For ALL Our Residents

A change is being made so that ALL electors living on Langford Village will be able to cast their votes at election times in the Hall at Langford Village Community Centre.

Residents on New Langford will no longer be made to go to the Garth to vote, which some found difficult because of the distance and having to cross the railway line. Instead New Langford electors will be able to vote in the Hall along with residents of the original Langford estate starting from the County Council elections on May 1st.

In another change, residents of Graven Hill will now have their own mobile polling station there and will no longer need to come to Langford’s Community Hall to vote.

The changes were agreed following feedback from many local people and some of Langford’s councillors. Full details can be found as part of a Cherwell District Council report that was approved in December 2024. You can click here to view it. 

This new structure will apply for all elections from now on. Any questions about it should be referred to the elections team at Cherwell District Council which manages all the elections and polling stations in our area.

Anyone who’s unsure about where they should vote should carefully check the documents they receive at their home prior to election day. For example, Flanders Close residents, who are just outside of Langford, will still need to vote at the Garth.

On elections day we expect to now have three polling booths within the Langford Community Hall and when you come to vote our teams will help direct you to the correct polling booth. This will depend on exactly where you live on Langford and you must also place your vote into the correct ballot box within the Hall.

We look forward to seeing you there soon!

Proposed 20mph limits on Langford

Oxfordshire County Council has a proposal out for consultation until February 14th to reduce all 30mph speed limits on all Bicester’s estate roads to 20mph. Please respond individually to the consultation as once again it will be the quantity of responses that will count in any final decision. The consultation closes at 5pm on Friday 14th February 2025.

To get to the consultation survey page please CLICK HERE

LVCA (Langford Village Community Association) has discussed and reached a conclusion to oppose the proposal after assessing the facts shown here :

FACT 1:

After two years’ worth of data collected from our speed awareness camera, Langford Village does not have a speeding problem. There are only 14.5% of vehicles travelling above 30mph compared to a national average of 50%. The 14.5% breaks down to 12% between 30 and 35mph, 2% at 35 to 40mph and 0.5% above 40mph.  The above 50mph tends to be late at night or in the early hours of the morning.

FACT 2:

There is not a speeding issue outside school at drop off/ pick up times, again verified by the speed awareness camera. Due to the large number of vehicles parked, it is not possible to drive at any speed along Peregrine Way.

FACT3:

Accident figures from OCC for the last 6 years – 2019 to 2024 show a total of 4 accidents in 6 years, none involving speeding, and no reported accidents on New Langford.

2019: one accident

Ø  a car turning into a parking area in the dark, hit a pedestrian, slight injury

2020: no accidents

2021: no accidents

2022: two accidents

Ø  a goods vehicle reversed into a pedestrian causing serious injury

Ø  A car and bike both turning left car caught bike, slight injury

2023: no accidents

2024: one accident

Ø  a car reversed into a pedestrian, slight injury

Anecdotal Feedback:

Residents in Launton, which now has a 20mph speed limit, say it has made the road more dangerous as impatient drivers are now overtaking cars doing 20mph.

The conclusion of the LVCA committee is:

There is no evidence to warrant a reduction in the speed limit for Langford Village, therefore we are opposing the proposal on the facts above and our concerns are that we could create an issue with cars overtaking those doing 20mph making the estate roads more dangerous. The money could be better spent on repairing the road surfaces – in particular Gavray Drive where vehicles are using the wrong side of the road to avoid the horrendous bumps that are back once again.

Langford Village Community Association Committee

London Road – Final Chance for Feedback

Our very last chance to have a say is NOW! Please take a few moments to send in your feedback to the East West Railway Company using the link that’s at the bottom of this post.

The EWR Consultation closes on Friday 24th January. Please fill in the form to say how you will be affected by closure of the crossing and why it’s vital to keep a crossing for vehicles there. EWR will only consider feedback made in this way or via the hard copy forms from the Library.

Remember, you only need to complete the Bicester to Bletchley section, not the whole form.

IMPORTANT: In question 5a you must select ‘Other’ and you can then write your comments about the need for a vehicle route over London Road in the box.

To go directly to the online form just follow this link ➡️https://www.smartsurvey.co.uk/s/8MJVPW/

Keep London Road Open: The Meeting Notes

The Langford Village Community Association’s notes related to the meeting on London Road and the campaign to keep a route open for vehicles there are now published online.

To view them please CLICK HERE.

Thank you to everyone who attended this important gathering to make comments and suggestions and to help plan next steps.

London Road: Online responding to the consultation

Once you’ve read this article, come back and CLICK HERE to go straight to the front page of the online form that we’re all asked to complete by 24th January. This will open a new tab and display the screen that you see below.

(We’ve added the orange arrows to help direct you and have called this ‘Step 1’)

Please note you ONLY need to use the ‘Oxford to Bletchley’ section of the form to comment on London Road. You do NOT need to complete any other route sections.

Next you should go through a few online pages that ask for your name and other information. Please complete this until you reach a page shown below. This is the start of the Oxford to Bletchley section of the online form (we’ve put in the arrow and called it Step 2, as below).

Now the very important bit!

On the next page YOU MUST SELECT THE ‘OTHER‘ INDICATOR shown by our arrow. Then go on to write your comments about what you want to happen (i.e. for EWR to ensure continuing access for vehicles across the rail line) in the box at the bottom of this screen.

Then just keep clicking on the ‘Next Page’ buttons until you reach the pages at the very end and eventually the Submit Feedback Form button.

That’s it, all done!

Except our local MP, Calum Miller, who’s also fighting to Keep London Road Open, is requesting that you also email him the comments you’ve made. His email address is calum.miller.mp@parliament.uk and we do urge you to please do this as well.

You might also like to write to the Transport Minister responsible for railways. This is Lord Peter Hendy and his email is hendyp@parliament.uk

Thank you everyone for all your support!

Public Meeting re London Road Crossing

Join us at a public meeting to cover next steps in the campaign to ensure continued access for all vehicles and pedestrians across the East West Rail route in Bicester once the London Road level crossing is permanently closed by EWR/Network Rail.

Monday 6th January 7.30pm at Langford Village Community Centre, OX26 6XX.

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