Thursday 7 July 2011

Café Connect 3 – Tuesday 5th July, Isle of Lewis

Tuesday kicked off with an early-morning drive from Bonar Bridge to Ullapool in time for the ferry to Stornoway and to meet up with tonight’s speaker, Dr David Corsar (dot.rural Computing Science Research Fellow).



Once in the Outer Hebrides (for the first time!) we popped in to the famous Charles MacLeod butchers for a Stornoway black pudding (or 3!)…





…ticked off another stone circle at Callanish and went into the blackhouse at Arnol… and came out smelling like a kipper!





Thought for the day: Forget me, more importantly, how long can a black pudding survive on the road?!

The Ravenspoint Café Connect community champion – John Randall (Chairman, Co-Chomunn na Pairc, the Pairc Community Co-operative) – cleverly tied in our talk date with the launch of the brand-new extension to the Ravenspoint Community Café.



The café, funded by Big Lottery Fund, HIE and CnES, is the latest addition to the Co-Chomunn na Pairc community enterprise. Locals and tourists can also find the Ravenspoint community shop, museum, archive and hostel on site.



The community turned out in full force, supporting John, the new café extension and the Café Connect pilot. During the speeches and obligatory ceremonial ribbon-cutting…



…the supporters were literally queuing out of every doorway.



David delivered his talk on ‘Driving Rural Transport: Mainland technologies for a small island?’ to a 24-strong audience!

David introduced the two dot.rural Accessibility & Mobilities projects, FITS and IRP, proposing that the Q&A session that followed be used to discuss the demand for, and applicability of, such initiatives within the context of island communities.



Tonight’s Café Connect turned out to be our most successful one yet. The audience was sizable – given these are all taking place in remote and/or rural communities – and demographically varied. Attendees included Donnie Morrison (Director of Co-Chomunn na Pairc, the Pairc Community Co-operative and HIE employee), Helen (Community Development Officer) and Malcolm Burr (Chief Executive of the Western Isles Council).

The Q&A session prompted lively discussion and lots of comments for me to feedback to the dot.rural researchers, potentially shaping the research. The venue (and the views!) was superb and there was a real sense of occasion.

A summary of the discussions…
- Reassessing the community bus use (expertly spotted beforehand by David, parked outside) which is currently estimated to be in use ~<5% of the time!
- Utilising the current hospital transport provision to maximum effect
- Concerns over the cost of fuel and the socio-economic impact on rural transport services
- The idea of having one ‘shared’ car per village, or even investigating what the optimal number of shared cars per village would be.
- The tensions of cheapened transport provision vs rural development and the potential (negative) socio-economic impact, e.g. free/subsidised transport to supermarkets in larger villages and towns reducing spend in community shops
- Looking into the introduction of ‘driver incentives’ (“driver is key”) when relying on goodwill is not sustainable.
- An idea of the timescales involved when tailoring such systems to each individual community.
- Issues over the legalities and ethics associated with FITS-type schemes and wider concerns for the ‘disengaged’, those who are not computer literate or who chose not to be digitally involved.

One member of the audience, who may turn up at Lizzy Tait’s ‘Power of Social Media’ Café Connect in Drumnadrochit on Monday 11th July, recorded the audio of David’s talk…

I managed to get online briefly (if I lived in the Outer Hebrides I don’t think I could ‘live’ without an iPhone) and finally tweet.

Unwinding over a couple of bottles of Celtic Black Ale back at the spotless Loch Erisort Inn, I knew that, if nothing else, the Café Connect principle has been proven tonight through this success at Ravenspoint.

Over the Café Connect series, I’m becoming more and more convinced that the success of such a pilot, and any follow-on initiatives, hinges on the champion; their place within the local community, the connections they have and their efforts invested in promoting the event locally beforehand. John has been an absolute star.

I’ll definitely be back. If not to stay in the Ravenspoint Hostel and (re!)sample the fantastic cupcakes, then to catch-up with John.

What’s the most impressive part of the evening? Being privileged enough to see such a focused and community-spirited group of people working together towards common goals.

Sadly there’s no time to see the looms weaving Harris Tweed with this gruelling schedule. Tomorrow, three ferries, a Café Connect in Castlebay and a 5.30 am start to check out the Harris beaches all lie in store. Yawn.

Claire

20 comments:

  1. I'm gladsome to mature so more serviceable and informative assemblage on your website.
    unsecuredloans online

    ReplyDelete
  2. In this cafe too many memories are attached for your life you write all about for your greatest moment of your life. architecture-dissertation help

    ReplyDelete
  3. Best Accounting Homework Help Available Since 2005! Get Assitance from Best Tutors, Best Services at Best Prices. No Registeration Required, Just Email Us.


    Accounting Homework Help

    ReplyDelete
  4. Statistics Homework Help Available! SPSS or Excel? Send us your Statistics Assignments and Get them completed on time at rock bottom prices!
    Statistics Help

    ReplyDelete
  5. Buy Coursework helps students with all kinds of academic work.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Do you find it tough to handle your financial assignments and fail to submit it within the stated deadlines? If yes, then Finance Homework Help offers you assistance to solve all your all problems and assignment related to finance. Be the first to submit your assignment without compromising with quality of the work and its accuracy. Get top grades with the work done by professionals within the deadline.for more details click here - Finance Assignment Help

    ReplyDelete
  7. Coursework Writing Servicepapers require a great deal of research and students fall short in that aspect.

    ReplyDelete
  8. We have highly trained professionals to meet our client’s demands. We understand the work asked by the client and work in the most efficient way to gratify them. We have also mastered in providing 24*7 homework help in various subjects like accounting, finance, programming with the help of our well qualified trainers. Statistics Assignment Help

    ReplyDelete
  9. Get custom written Marketing Essay,Thesis, Research Papers and Dissertation by trained Writers at very Reasonable prices.

    ReplyDelete
  10. The Internet is very useful device to search and find a plethora of information and knowledge, on many subjects required for their studies.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Get Buy Coursework USA and Editing Help. Professional Services Available at Affordable Prices for Coursework Help.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Social Study Homework Help gives you the perfect opportunity to shine among your classmates. Yes, it is possible as with our college homework help better services you will eventually get improved grades that will help you get noticed by the faculty.

    ReplyDelete
  13. 24/7 Best Custom Dissertation Writing Service & Custom Dissertation Writing Service Available in UK. Best Writers Available at nominal prices. Just send us an email with all the details.

    ReplyDelete
  14. The main assistance that this group provides is related to academic writing, business writing, writing of thesis etc.
    College Homework Help

    ReplyDelete
  15. Are you looking for Dissertation Writing Service UK? Our writers can help you round the clock. Contact us for best grades. Hire Professional Writers at most reasonable Prices.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Availing the services of Essay Writing Service is easy and hassle free. What you all have to do is to just email them all the details of your desired subject matter, you will get what you want at the best possible time. We will provide you with a quote and you can henceforth make a secure payment online.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Coursework Writing Service has been known for the excellent academic help extended by them to thousands of students. The latter often find it difficult to complete their assignments successfully after their busy schedule. They often require certain online help in order to save time. Coursework writing services comes to their rescue whenever they need any help regarding the assignments or coursework.

    ReplyDelete

  18. The effectiveness of IEEE Project Domains depends very much on the situation in which they are applied. In order to further improve IEEE Final Year Project Domains practices we need to explicitly describe and utilise our knowledge about software domains of software engineering Final Year Project Domains for CSE technologies. This paper suggests a modelling formalism for supporting systematic reuse of software engineering technologies during planning of software projects and improvement programmes in Project Centers in Chennai for CSE.

    Spring Framework has already made serious inroads as an integrated technology stack for building user-facing applications. Spring Framework Corporate TRaining the authors explore the idea of using Java in Big Data platforms.
    Specifically, Spring Framework provides various tasks are geared around preparing data for further analysis and visualization. Spring Training in Chennai

    ReplyDelete
  19. Christina Daniel15 July 2021 at 13:14

    I just wanted to say that I found your site via Google and I am glad I did. Keep up the good work and I will make sure to bookmark you for when I have more free time away from the books Microsoft Power BI Certification: DA-100 Exam Prep. Thanks again!

    ReplyDelete