flaps

I wonder about the old Wilko shop behind the Port Erin store. Also the Ballasalla Merc garage site, and the warehouse in Pulrose?

Jeezuss, there's some proper cunty comments on this thread... Some people are just absolute cunts aren't they? So depressing...

I'm sure a heavily policed speed limit would be more effective in reducing the woeful serious RTC statistics than banning cyclists. Lets face it - most cyclists don't go up there even when it's not TT. The high number of collisions is mostly due to excessive speed. You can argue about that if you want. It won't change the truth though.

Every TT there are a large number of serious accidents up there, with people doing excessive speeds on an open road, that's little more than a narrow mountain pass. The governments own statistics show dozens of serious injuries and a few fatalities every year. And our solution to this situation? Ban cyclists... Yeah, that'll help...

I'm all for the 50 on the Round Table road - I've seen some shocking driving along there. But - if that road justifies a temporary limit over TT, due to a couple of serious accidents, how come that the mountain, which has loads of serious accidents, is limit free? Some inconsistency there. If the road safety strategy is indeed taking an "Evidence based approach" like it says it is, then there's loads of evidence of excessive speed related collisions on the mountain, yet no attempt to curtail it.

Yes! I saw that and thought he let it slip there - after all the bullshit stories about flying airbuses, within seconds of sitting in the simulator the alarms were going off. When they asked the instructor if they thought Jeremy would make a pilot, they said, "Er, no..." Hilarious!

And those two have both left... I think it's fair to say we should not take anything he says at face value. You only need to look at his many social media accounts to see that he's fond of "embellishing" the truth. Wasn't he suspended last year from Christmas to Easter pending an investigation into his conduct? Then on his unexpected return the director resigned? There's obviously a lot more to this than what is in his resignation e-mail. We'll probably never hear the airport staffs side of the story, but I expect it would differ somewhat to his version.

In the Examiner this week, page 6, there's a piece about Civil Servant employments, related to Tynwald questions from Jason Moorhouse to Kate Lord-Brennan. from the article: Mr Moorhouse asked about pre-employment checks for prospective government employees during the application process. Ms Lord-Brennan said the standard checks include a collection of references, verification of essential qualifications via sight of original certificates or certified copies, identity and the right to work on island checks, in accordance with prevention of illegal working. Mr Moorhouse followed this up with a supplementary question. He said "If concerns are raised by a third party about an employees earlier status, why can existing materials not be reviewed or checks carried out, based on informal and unnamed tip-offs? A recent inquiry suggests that it is not possible even if an employee is holding a significant role within government. Is that the case, and if it is, could it be reviewed?" Ms Lord-Brennan said "I am not commenting on any individual case whatsoever. I can say though, if the Office of Human Resources is made aware of any concerns or discrepancies coming to light this will be investigated to verify information provided. That would be raised with the recruiting manager, if required , and any appropriate action taken". What is the recent inquiry Mr Moorhouse referring to?

I had covid a couple of weeks ago, and rang 111, where they persuaded me to get a PCR test. They're still issuing those legal isolate notices, saying you mustn't leave your home for 10 days, not even for exercise, or you'll be fined £40,000. And they contact you to check. I'm sure a lot of people, who are more savvy, or less socially concious, than me, will think "sod that" and just sort it out themselves with a LFT from the chemist. Which will make the official numbers a huge under-estimate. And if the numbers aren't right, then what's the point?

I think you're right about "courting Easyjet" being above airport management - that's the only explanation. Easyjet pay half the rate per passenger than Flybe did, so for every passenger they took off Flybe, the airport lost revenue. Not only did they lose revenue, but costs increased and huge amounts were spent on extras for them - an exclusive holding lounge, a £2.5M apron, widening the runoff areas etc. Another issue people will remember was the massive queues. In the Flybe days, the morning departures would be staggered. Say, 60 passengers, 30 seconds each through security, half an hour per plane. But if there's 2 Easyjets in at once, 300 passengers - hours to get everyone through security. So millions were spent on a new baggage scanner, building works to accommodate it and of course the ongoing costs of the contracted out staff to run it. Of course, all this would be OK if the island was chocka with tourists, due to the cheap flights, but it's not. The slight increase in passengers pre-covid was locals going away to spend elsewhere, not new visitors coming to spend here. And of course, we now have less services. Is it better to have a small plane every day to places like, say, Belfast, or a big plane once or twice a week? Is that better service for an island community with no alternative? We used to have 4 or 5 flights a day to Liverpool, similar to Manchester, plus a couple a day to Birmingham. Is one flight a day or less really what we want? Is that actually better?

Leaving him in charge is what's got the airport in the mess it is. While the Director was distracted with other Ports stuff, he's run amok with his schemes, spending, hiring, firing. It will be interesting to see how he gets on with the interim Director - he won't take no messing. Anyway, So now the Director job has been advertised, which forgotten reality TV nobody could join "Dr" Jez? How about Maureen from Driving School? Nasty Nick from Big Brother? Wagner from X-Factor?

Yep, totally agree. Even before Covid there was far too much chasing Easyjet, to no benefit. They didn't bring in any more visitors, as hoped, and because of their preferential rates the revenue has gone down, while costs to accommodate them, have gone up. Amazingly, the talk of "corporatisation" hasn't gone away, despite it being a no-hoper even before Covid. There's certainly no case for that now.

I'm amazed that road safety wasn't a bigger issue in the run up to the election. None of the candidates in my constituency gave it more than the briefest mention in their manifesto. I think it's seen as a contentious issue, so they are afraid to say anything. The interviews in the newspaper almost all said they wouldn't support an all island speed limit. A couple of years ago, just before covid, the new road safety strategy document was released, and it was a deeply flawed piece, full of contradictions. The vision for the strategy is: "A future where no-one is killed or sustains serious/life changing injuries on our roads". There's lots of talk of the fatal four, and safe systems approach etc, which is all good, but then there's stuff like "Speed Limits will not be considered on a blanket basis, rather on a case by case basis, informed by evidence". Well, clearly, if this was true, there would be a heavily policed speed limit on the mountain road, as their own evidence shows there is a high number of speed-related collisions; often single vehicle. So, the strategy is obviously just words on a page to look good, and not something that happens in real life. The figures quoted are sobering - averaging around 1000 RTC's per year, 238 with injuries (many will be more than one person injured, so the number of people injured will be much higher than the number of injury collisions), 58 seriously injured, and 7 fatals. So, roughly, there's 2 or 3 crashes (that the police know about) every day, one of which will involve injury. Someone seriously injured at least one per week, and a fatality every couple of months. Disappointingly, the accompanying Action Plan document has lots of waffle about gathering evidence, analysing data, reviewing strategy etc, but very little about actually doing anything. The problem with "gathering evidence", is that if you do that for, say 5 more years, that's another few hundred seriously injured and 35 dead. It seems to me that it would be better to do something now than faff about behind a desk looking at graphs for a few more years. In the 5 years 2013-17 29 dead, 217 seriously injured - and it would seem nobody is interested in doing anything about it.

The Close Leece Farm cafe is well done - an original cottage/barn with a modern extension out the back. Also Salmon Lake cafe by the Laxey Wheel. I agree re Watterson. Not said a peep about local issues for years, then suddenly pipes up about the Post Office and Cosy Nook when there's an election coming up.

Those MotoCyz bikes were well trick. Such a shame what happened with them. Bloke was a genius.

The low-cost airline business model doesn't work for us. The low-cost carrier says to an airport "we'll pay you half your usual landing fee, but we'll bring you loads of extra passengers, who you can fleece on parking and charges etc". Hence airports charging £7 an hour to park, and £2.50 just to drop off. £10 to jump the security queue etc. Except our airport can't fleece our passengers on parking etc because we just won't pay it. Ballasalla would be full, and the car park empty. Same with shops and cafe's - we don't arrive at the airport 3 hours early looking for food and perfume and giant Toblerones. So our airports options for making the money back aren't there. So the "low-cost" carrier pay us half what other carriers do/did, and revenue actually falls. They take passengers from other carriers but don't actually bring any new business, so no benefit there. Not only that, they make demands on the airport - exclusive lounge, extra baggage scanners and the staff to run them, extra deep concrete apron, etc etc. So costs rise as revenue falls. Not only that, low cost carriers like to fill a big plane, once a day, maybe only a few days per week, at a time that suits them. That's a lot less convenient for us than the 4 or 5 flights a day we used to have to Liverpool. But hey! Cheap flights! Except as soon as there's no competition, they're not cheap any more...

Maybe if the TT zero was for production bikes, rather than prototypes, there might be more entries, and so more of a proper race?

https://www.manxradio.com/news/isle-of-man-news/police-urgently-seek-driver-after-crash-leaves-woman-injured/

I think they are. Or at least, more drivers are going too fast. It's not just the odd boy racer dickhead now - it's all sorts of people; Mums in Range Rovers, Athol Street types, builders in vans, all sorts, going far far too fast. Speeds that would attract the attention of the police on a motorway are commonplace on our country roads. It's not just the mountain. Gansey/Fishers Hill, Poortown, Cronk-y-Voddy, Ballamodha. I'm amazed at some of our roads that have no limit at all. Many of the roads around the north have no limit, despite being lined with houses, farms, junctions etc. There's a section between lower Foxdale and The Hope that has no limit. The houses all have mirrors opposite their driveways. It must be a nightmare getting out of their own house. There's a blind dip too. So much for the "evidence based approach".

Totally agree. I don't buy the "It'll ruin the TT" argument at all. I've been a motorcyclist for 30 years. I've been to WSB, NW200 etc. At no point have I ever heard anyone say "I really fancy going to the NW,/motogp etc but there's speed limits so I won't bother". If there are a small number who will stop coming to the IOM because we clamp down on road safety, then surely that's a good thing? We don't want nutters here driving like twats. And as the island is full each year, their place will be taken by others, who hopefully want to live to come back next year. There are popular sporting events that attract large numbers of visitors the world over. Nowhere else would accept our road casualties as "just how it is". I don't think the TT in some way makes us a special case, as it says in the road safety strategy. Visitors should be expected to drive with the same care as always. The problem with having no speed limit at all, is that it removes a handy tool for prosecution. If somebody is driving far too fast for the road, the police have nothing to get them with, as technically they're not breaking the law. They can't bring it to court, as it's too subjective, whereas, if there's say, a 40 limit, and someone is doing 90, it's clear cut. Licence removed.

Not specifically, but the increase in May and June is noticeable. 2013-17, of the 246 KSI's, 116 were in May and June. There are significantly more collisions, and as those collisions involve motorcycles (where the rider is more vulnerable than a driver in a metal box) the rate of KSI's is very high. So, of the 71 KSI's in June, 60 were motorcycles. So yes, the TT has a significant impact, but there's still a lot of collisions all year round. 7 fatalities per year on average (2015-17), 58 seriously injured. Every week someone is seriously injured on our roads, on average. Pretty shocking really.

Yes, I've found a table in the road safety strategy document - from 1998-2017 there were 19,502 over that 20 years noted by police. so, averaging just under 1000 RTC's per year. Of those nearly 20,000 collisions, just under 5000 slight injuries, 1243 collisions resulting in serious injury to at least one person involved, and 156 collisions resulting in 1 or more fatalities.

I think the 700 was 9 months, not a full year. It was July-March, or something similar.

Construction waste today!!!.... A AND B METALSSS!!!!! A AND B METALSSS!!!! Construction waste today!!! QuaySIIIIDE!!!! QUAYSIDE QUAYSIDE WE'VE GOT THE TYRES FOR YOOOOOO!!!!! Construction waste today!!!... off...

You've got the wrong end of the stick there. They're selling so many e-bikes and bicycles, theyve expanded into the car showroom. Definitely not just selling off bits. The shop has had a full refurb, and is very nice with lots of stock.