Trolley 15a

Trolley 15 has been spotted, in the stream down Longmead Road, but has yet to be recovered. Following the precedent set by my first trolley (see reference 1), I need to remember to take a length of rope and a stick so that I can fish the thing out of the stream without getting wet - with the stick serving as support while one loops the end of the rope through the trolley.

I notice also the refusal of permission for a chemist to open in one of the vacant shops at the northern end of Manor Green Road. I wonder what business the council has to spend its valuable time on regulating such matters: is it not enough for market forces to act on all the chemists jostling for position and livelihood in the area? Why do we need the dead hand of the council in on the matter? The council may well have a point in that there are already quite a lot of chemists in the vicinity - including Horton Retail, West Ewell, Ewell Village and Epsom proper. But is it a point for them? Why should they second guess the professional judgement of a wannabee chemist? It is different with much larger and more expensive things like hospitals where a bit of central planning clearly is called for.

I associate to McDonalds. I read a story about them once which had it that they were really a real estate company. They rented out premises & branding to franchisees for a tidy sum, leaving said franchisees to make what living they could over and above that. But when renting to someone, they often made nice promises about not renting to anyone else in the vicinity, and then not keeping to the promises, leaving rather a lot of franchisees in that particular area. It occurs to me that what might be best for McDonalds in such a scenario might not be best for the franchisees: maximisation of the profits of the one might not coincide with maximising the profits of the others. To which the market forces people would presumably say caveat emptor.

I notice also the advertised arrival of a wine bar in Ewell Village, in what used to be 'Suite Deal Furnishing' (roughly gmaps 51.348283, -0.248002) and where there may also be a planning interest, but which strikes me as an entirely reasonable speculation. As someone who has been moved off beer onto wine, I have often wondered why there is no wine bar in the borough and the location, in the middle of a High Street with plenty of other bars & restaurants seems to me to be entirely reasonable. I wish them well.

PS: clearly a lot of us up and about this morning. For once in a while the internet is struggling and gmaps is really limping along.

Reference 1: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/civics-2.html.