Tour de France – cycling history in Epping Forest District

Epping Forest District Museum

There has been a lot of excitement building with the Tour de France coming through the district on 7th July.

As part of the Museum on the Move programme the Museum team will be at Epping Town Show on Sunday 6th July making masks and flags ready for Monday 7th July.

Leading up to the day the Museum has been sharing historic cycling images from the district on the Museum’s twitter page @EFDMuseum. We will be sharing many more things from the Museum’s photographic archives throughout the Museum’s redevelopment so why not follow us on Twitter or like us on Facebook to see them!

The District has a long cycling history; from Ongar Cycling Club and the Cottis family of Epping to the increased interest in cycling as a pastime within the forest. So here are some of the best historic cycling images from the Museum’s collection.

W. Cottis and…

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Make a difference, be a parish councillor

Justin's #hyperlocal democracy blog

Back in May there was barely a mention in the media of the historic elections to London’s first ever parish council in Queen’s Park, Westminster. To be expected really given their obsession with what would happen to UKIP and the Liberal Democrats in the European elections and how many London’s borough councils would turn red.

But the same might happen again next year, when the vast majority of parish council elections are potentially held on the same day as the General Election.While there is always stiff competition to get into Parliament, this isn’t always the case for the first tier of Government. And this concerns me. A lot.

Just over two years ago my colleague Danny Moody from the Northamptonshire Association of Local Councils wrote a guest post on their efforts to promote local democracy in the county and some important points about holding public office at a very local level. Well he’s been at it again, this time with a brilliant piece for his county eUpdate (their newsletter) on…

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