Ankh-Morpork

A good Valentines day, in that I hit the 'lost two stone' goal, although nothing romantic occured, perhaps because I went of to Taunton for my Young and Talented (and slightly lighter) Councillor course. As usual we saw some very interesting things, that will slowly leak out here as my own initiatives for Truro, and met some interesting people . We visited Wincanton, which was described as 'a market town without a market, twinned with somewhere that doesn't exist'. It being twinned with Ankh-Morpork, a city in the Disc World series and boasts the Ankh-Morpork Post Office and Consulate, something that could be a tacky souveneir shop but is actually brilliant, mainly because the people running it love what they're doing. Find them at http://www.discworldemporium.com/ .

But the most interesting thing about Wincanton is that they seem to have managed to keep the locally owned shops, and fought off the chain stores. Something we in Truro have struggled with. This seems to be down to the local member, Cllr Tim Carroll, having made himself a planning expert, he even reads Planning News!, which enables him to deal with officers and developers from a strong position. Not sure I want to suscribe to that myself, but it has been becoming obvious to me that its not enough to have a feeling that a developement is wrong, you have to be able to demonstrate it using the planning system. I wonder if Trafalgar Stores stocks Planning News?