Letters
Great idea,
but where are the lifts?
Dr Eva Frojmovic
Director,
Centre for Jewish Studies
The new disability
services centre is good news. But having just moved into
the second floor of an office building with no disabled
access, I cannot help feeling that some of the £500,000
would have been better spent on installing lifts. Or perhaps
I should just wait until a disabled student sues us? That
will speed things up.
With safety
and wildlife in mind
Robert Sladdin
Director
of Estates
There is no
formal policy about cutting back shrubs for security purposes,
but pruning and replanting are a normal and necessary
activity for estate services. Where security is felt to
be a problem, shrub beds are usually completely removed
and replaced by low growing shrubs.
The cotoneaster
bed mentioned near Cavendish Hall has been thinned with
the height retained; doing this keeps the height for scale,
and importantly does not remove this year’s flowers, and
therefore the berries upon which birds will feed this
autumn. The area underneath will be replanted with a suitable
species of shrub.
There are over
20,000 square metres of planting on campus which has been
gradually increasing over the last 15 years. Off campus
at various residences, estates manages many areas of boundary
trees and woodlands with habitat and therefore wildlife
conservation in mind. Whilst managing conflicting objectives,
the landscape and environment provided for the University
are always an important factor for estate services.
Curry house
is not a pretty sight
Mark Nelson
Senior
Lecturer, School of Philosophy
Can nothing
be done about the dreadful appearance of the ‘Curry Corner’
restaurant (formerly ‘Suhana’s’), on Woodhouse Lane, opposite
the School of Engineering?
For years,
its demolished, rubbish-strewn annexe has been an eyesore,
and cannot help anyone in forming a positive impression
of this University and its environs.
Smoking out
the vegetarians...
Professor
David Fairer
Director,
School of English
Now that Senate,
as an academic body, has moved to prohibit smoking in
individual offices, could I suggest that it consider a
campus-wide ban on smoking along all footpaths and pavements?
Songbirds too
are affected by passive smoking, especially on windless
days (and note also the dearth of campus sparrows). A
cleaner environment is healthy for everyone.
Also, in view
of the latest alarming research on ‘passive eating’, can
I suggest that Senate use its authority to segregate the
eating arrangements in the SCR? Nothing is more horrible
to us ‘non-meat-and-fish eaters’ (to use language your
readers will understand) than to breathe in the fumes
of the burnt corpses of salmon and pig.
And please
– no more New Zealand tofu – the poor pink-nosed little
animal has virtually been hunted to extinction
Yours concernedly
P.C. Vigil
Air Enhancement
Unit & Flexible Projects
...and sounding
out the semanticists
Andrew J.
Baczkowski
Department
of Statistics
The common
theme in the latest Reporter is dictionaries!
Ultrasound
is ‘non-invasive’ and ‘not radiative’? Doesn’t it go inside?
Doesn’t radiation include sound radiation? What is meant
by ‘harmless’ (which I don’t agree with – Medline gives
plenty of references suggesting harmful effects) and ‘not
electromagnetic radiation.’
And as for
me not eating meat, I would happily change the subject
by telling someone I am a vegetarian – even while enjoying
a poached salmon sandwich!
Pushing back
the age of retirement
Adrian Smith
Edward
Boyle Library
According to
John Carvel, social affairs editor of the Guardian: "The
average retirement age would have to rise to 72 to maintain
the present balance between the working population and
numbers of older dependents, according to demographic
forecasts published yesterday by the office for national
statistics.
"The proposal
to raise the state retirement age to 65 for women – to
be phased in between 2010 and 2020 – would for a while
reduce the economic impact of ageing. But an increase
in the average retirement age to 72.3 years would be needed
to maintain the present support ratio after 2040."
This may need
to be built into our strategic planning...?
