Oxley Woods Living

Life in an Oxley Woods eco house

 
 

Archive for the ‘General’ Category

 

A rude awakening

April 6, 2009

Last weekend, for the first time ever, we were a little unnerved about living so close to Oakhill Prison.

About 3am or so my wife and I were rudely awakened by a huge noise outside the house, we had no idea what was going on, but it was like the builders were driving by in their heavy equipment or something. Next thing, we had an extremely bright light shining on us through the high level window in our bedroom which provides a lovely view of the sky at night!

Turns out it was a helicopter going over and around the entire area, several times, searching for someone or something that, we can only guess, was trying to break into or out of the prison?!

Amazingly the kids slept through it all, and I never felt the desire to call the prison or local police to see if they could shed some light on the subject (beyond that they shone through our bedroom windows already), but it was weird, lying there watching the search light go back and forth and the helicopter hovering above!

It could be nothing to do with the prison, we had similar experiences when living elsewhere in Milton Keynes (it IS a lovely place, honest!), but your imagination can run wild at that time in the morning!

Electricity bill from hell

November 18, 2008

Check your meters folks.

This week we had our first electricity bill from ScottishPower, and my God it was scary… Our quarterly bill was in excess of £600!!  Now, due to our problems George Wimpey have offered to pay our bill, as they’re using a lot of power coming in and sorting out all the issues, but still, that’s a HUGE amount and didn’t bode well for the future when we’ll be picking up the tab.

Checking the bill, the reading was an “actual” reading, as opposed to estimate, so it wasn’t looking good.  Picking myself off the ground I ventured outside to double check our meter, and it turned out it was about 4,000 kilowatts less than the “actual” reading on the bill.

A quick (and it was quick, hats off to ScottishPower in answering the phones rapidly) phone call later and an amended bill, reduced by nearly £500, is on its way to us as I type.  Thank heavens.

Just goes to show it’s worth double checking your meter readings, even if they claim to be “actual” figures.  I thought with all the energy saving features, bulbs, appliances etc the bills shouldn’t be too painful, hopefully when the builders move out things will improve further.

The truth is out there…

November 10, 2008

Although I’m not entirely sure where “there” is, but it’s nice to know we’re not alone in our situation, or at least some of it.

What the events of last week say about modern culture in the UK I have no idea, but I had a knock at the door from someone who lives just down the road, who had been online and happened to stumble across this blog.  Bringing a message of solidarity and understanding no less.  Who says neighbours don’t talk to each other anymore.  They just need to find each other online first?!

Anyway, it turns out that we’re not alone, but contrary to the information we were given at the supposedly open and honest meeting earlier in the week, it would seem to be that it’s far from just us and one other who’ve experienced the effects of rain water on the inside of their Oxley Woods eco house.  Either the management are extremely forgetful, or less honest than it at first appeared.

Anyway, I had good long chat with our neighbour, comparing notes and problems, and it WAS nice to learn that we’re not alone in suffering at the hands of Wimpey and Wood Newton.  Things could be taken further on that front, as we now know that it’s not just a couple of us who’ve experienced issues with the building and some of their eco-friendly features, and it would be very interesting to know how widespread the situation is, as Wimpey et al clearly are in no mood to share that with us themselves, and who can blame them?!

As an aside, work was due to start towards the end of the week or start of this week on the front of the property.  Friday I had one of the Wood Newton team bring over a side elevation of our property for us to mark down the damaged Trespa panels on.  Unfortunately, despite having our plot number on it, the plans/elevation do NOT match our property?!  At the same time, we arranged for them to come around at 8:30 this morning to begin work.  They wanted 8:15 am, but that was just too early for us and the kids to be sorted.

About 9am this morning we get a knock, it’s raining, it’s been raining hard a lot lately, and they were waiting for head office to inform them if they could or could not apply the seal/tape/primer in the rain.  We said no problem, just keep us informed.  It’s now 14:30, we’ve not seen or heard anything since.  I guess they’re not coming back.

Welcome to Oxley Woods Living

September 6, 2008

Welcome to our new website.  We’re a family of four who in the summer of 2008 moved into our new home, which just happens to be one of over 140 new eco homes to built by George Wimpey on their Oxley Woods sites, which is located in Oxley Park, Milton Keynes.

We’re starting this site/blog in September 2008, a few months after we moved in, but it’s been a very hectic, exciting, not to mention extremely stressful couple of months, so much so we never got around to writing down events properly, until now.

We hope this site proves interesting, maybe even useful, to people interested in architecture, housing and urban design and planning, and of course the ever increasing popular, and very important subject of eco houses.

We hope to introduce a residents forum too, so fellow Oxley Woods residents can share their own experiences, make suggestions, and possibly plan local events and get togethers.  This could also be a place for those interested in moving into the area, or another eco home, to get some feedback from current occupants.

It’s all a bit vague now, but we hope you can find at least something to interest and entertain you on Oxley Woods Living!