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Horse and carriage plan falls at final hurdle

7:12pm Monday 19th December 2011 in News

PLANS to allow horse drawn carriages to carry tourists through the streets of Oxford have been turned down.

Oxford City Council rejected the plan at a full council meeting tonight.

Councillors had concerns about the health of horses in the summer sun, congestion and the safety of other road users.

Ed Turner said: "My concern is around traffic, animal welfare, safety of cyclists, motorists and pedestrians.

"I just don't think Oxford city centre is the right place for this."

Comments(17)

Dilligaf2010 says...
8:11pm Mon 19 Dec 11

Ed Turner said: "My concern is around traffic, animal welfare, safety of cyclists, motorists and pedestrians.

"I just don't think Oxford city centre is the right place for this."

Roughly translated means, there's no money in it for us.

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Andrew:Oxford says...
8:17pm Mon 19 Dec 11

Probably for the best.

What about the other news from the council meeting tonight...

Were SIA qualified/approved staff required to remove rude and rowdy self-righteous individuals?

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urban resident says...
11:01pm Mon 19 Dec 11

Were you at the meeting Andrew?

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oxfordbuddy says...
11:41pm Mon 19 Dec 11

The message is, get hysterical enough and the councillors will give in. I expect Animal Aid etc are pleased with themselves. I look forward to their continuing protests outside of the abbattoir where the horse will end up. Horses are not cuddly pets who sit by the fire, they are working animals. Most racehorses end up in pet food.

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Andrew:Oxford says...
11:43pm Mon 19 Dec 11

urban resident wrote:
Were you at the meeting Andrew?
Not at the meeting, no. Was still in the City at 17.00 this evening.

Although not on the Agenda for legal reasons...

Nigel Gibson was protesting about closure of Temple Cowley Pool by presenting the Golden Petition and advising about the legal challenge. They are currently collecting money for the legal challenge*.

William Clark was protesting about children of Oxford enjoying a safe and brand new fun pool near his home in the near future.

Jane Alexander was protesting, it's a hobby.


* You can donate money to the Coop Bank in Skelmersdale sort code 089299, account 65517499. Why not deposit a cheque for a £1, then place a "stop" on the cheque? They'll be charged £6 for the privilege of you donating nothing.

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oxfordbuddy says...
11:43pm Mon 19 Dec 11

oh and the next time there are football hooligans about or other protestors and those poor police horses are out and about in the summer sun, hurting their little feetees on the nasty, hard pavements and about to bolt at any moment and hurt a bystander, let's hope our brave councillors will be out there defending us all.

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oxfordbuddy says...
11:46pm Mon 19 Dec 11

TCP campaign is another one where endless hysteria on the part of some nimbys who want to be able to walk to a nearby pool is showing just how fickle most councillors are. What on earth do they get paid for, out of our taxes???

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museli says...
8:45am Tue 20 Dec 11

oxfordbuddy wrote:
The message is, get hysterical enough and the councillors will give in. I expect Animal Aid etc are pleased with themselves. I look forward to their continuing protests outside of the abbattoir where the horse will end up. Horses are not cuddly pets who sit by the fire, they are working animals. Most racehorses end up in pet food.
Well if the horse breeding industry were prevented from cynically churning out thousands of horses on the off chance a winner would emerge then these intelligent creatures wouldn't end up in pet food.

Horses have not been working animals in this country for decades - they are now treated more like a commodity to be traded for the profit of the heartless and the entertainment of dimwits.

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oxfordbuddy says...
10:04am Tue 20 Dec 11

Depends how you define work but certainly the majority of horses pass from hand to hand, often insensitively and badly treated on the way. But then at root, it's all about money whether it's the bloodstock industry or parents with more money than sense buying a pony and not knowing what they are doing. That's the absurdity of the furore over this application, this IS a guy who knows what he is doing, the horse will do real work, will not be abused and will be a source of interest to tourists and city dwellers alike. Meanwhile, Oxford has the biggest number of homeless people in the country but let's spend our time worrying about the fate of one bl**dy horse!!

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Darkforbid says...
12:17pm Tue 20 Dec 11

"Oxford has the biggest number of
homeless people in the country but let's
spend our time worrying about the fate
of one bl**dy horse!! ”

No its not even close to the numbers in other towns/cities... it does however have the highest number of housed claiming to be homeless...

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Dilligaf2010 says...
12:50pm Tue 20 Dec 11

I agree with the points being raised about the homeless, I'd like to know how the Council decide who needs to be homed, I regularly see an elderly gent on crutches walking about with his rucksack & sleeping bag, but at the same time, I know of an alcoholic, drug using couple, who occupy a 2 bedroom flat at the expense of the Tax payer, in short, the Tax payers are funding their alcohol, drugs, rent, council tax, and a mobility scooter, how does that work?

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Andrew:Oxford says...
12:59pm Tue 20 Dec 11

Dilligaf2010 wrote:
I agree with the points being raised about the homeless, I'd like to know how the Council decide who needs to be homed, I regularly see an elderly gent on crutches walking about with his rucksack & sleeping bag, but at the same time, I know of an alcoholic, drug using couple, who occupy a 2 bedroom flat at the expense of the Tax payer, in short, the Tax payers are funding their alcohol, drugs, rent, council tax, and a mobility scooter, how does that work?
Easy. The word "addict" and "vulnerable" are readily interchangeable.

Two addicts score more points than one vulnerable

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CarriageHorseLover says...
8:39pm Tue 20 Dec 11

First let me say that I am olny acqualnted with Oxford via the various BBC TV series that are filmed there, but my late father visited there often when he was stationed in Great Britian as a member of the US Army Air Corps during WWII. I have laways hoped to one day visit myself.

I am disappointed that the City Council, or what ever its proper name is failed to approve the use of carriage horses for tours in old Oxford. I operate a small livery in my little historic town in the Deep South of the USA.

I believe a properly run horse carriage livery offering tours of very historic Oxford would have been of a benefit to your city. And from what I have read, I believe that the councillors might have been unduley swayed by misinformation and pressuer supplied by radical animal rights extremists. I am sorry to learn that these well organized groups are also over in the UK sturring up trouble for honest working people who just want to be able to run a needed tour business. I hope this issue can be revisited, and that your political leaders will see that carriage livery can be operated safely with proper regulations in place.

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museli says...
9:52am Wed 21 Dec 11

You don't want to draw conclusions about the traffic situation in Oxford from watching fictional TV CarriageHorseLover. We have a chaotic mix of cyclists, buses, cabs and cars which are carefully screened out when the cameras are in town. Even in areas where private cars are not supposed to be allowed we fail to meet air quality standards a lot of the time. Laws and regulations are constantly ignored.

Oxford is still well worth a visit though. There is no where on the rejected carriage route that wouldn't be quicker and simpler to visit on foot. Meanwhile Mr Merry continues to offer carriage rides round quiet country lanes and historic villages nearby which I understand include a visit to a country pub and non of us radical animal rights extremists object to.

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tjnmaxwell says...
8:59pm Tue 10 Jan 12

Well even if it hadn't been vetoed-

If a local authority has a numerical restriction on the number of
hackney carriage licences it issues (and Oxford City Council does), this
must include any horse drawn or person drawn vehicles.

They would have had to have been pre-booked! Pre-booked = ruined buisness.

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tjnmaxwell says...
9:00pm Tue 10 Jan 12

Even if it wasn't vetoed it would have had to have run as a pre-booked service anyway!

If a local authority has a numerical restriction on the number of
hackney carriage licences it issues (and Oxford City Council does), this
must include any horse drawn or person drawn vehicles.

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CarriageHorseLover says...
4:07pm Wed 11 Jan 12

Horse-drawn tours are successfully operated in very many US cities including New York, despite what radical animal rights extremists would have you believe. Of course, they are REALLY against not only the use of horse-drawn carriages, but all horse use.

Anyway, I doubt that the traffic in Oxford can be any more chaotic than that of NYC. Again, I'm sorry to hear that Oxford has banned the use of horse-drawn carriages and wonder if this ban applies to ALL horse-drawn carriages or only to those that stand in "hack lines"? In other words, can someone still hire and use a horse-drawn carriage in the city for a special event such as a wedding?

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