Due to current overcrowding in British prisons, people on bail in Blackburn are to be given a choice of either being fitted with a normal leg tag monitor or receiving earlier release by taking part in an experiment which uses a robot dog to monitor their activities.

Some years ago, my girlfriend and I were sat in one of Blackburn’s town centre pubs having a beer.  Then a lad came in wearing shorts, despite it being the middle of winter.  Sylvia pointed out that along with a sheepish grin, he was wearing a tag on his leg.  With my usual naivety, I thought he was wearing his watch on his leg.  After all, this is Blackburn and some people like to do strange things in this town.

He walked around the bar making sure everyone could see what he was wearing.  This didn’t go down well with some customers, they questioned whether or not he should be served.  But having a bail hostel in our town centre, he wouldn’t be on his own.

Due to huge demands on Britain’s spiralling prison population, ways are being looked at to ease overcrowding and reduce this situation.  One of these ways is to reduce prisoner’s sentences or let them out earlier than their initial release date.  This is where today’s world of high technology comes in.  Tags are very handy and have proved useful in the past.  But they tend to draw attention to individuals wearing them, which sometimes isn’t such a good idea.

Many of us will have seen these nature programmes on TV which utilise ‘spy’ animals.  The animatronic creatures featured have proved very effective infiltrating habitats and filming animals they are modelled upon.  These TV programmes have not gone unnoticed by prison and probation services.

Due to adverse reaction from the public over wearing of tags, a suggestion has been put forward for something completely different and more pleasing to the eye for most people.  What could be better than man’s best friend?

Perhaps a surveillance dog could be the answer.  Those on bail would be fitted with a lead connected to an artificial spy dog and be able to frequent places away from their home.  This spy dog would also keep a record of their ‘master’s’ movements.  They could even take their animatronic companion into pubs which allow dogs.  After all, this kind of dog won’t be peeing on any carpet or crapping on the doormat.

We are a nation of dog lovers, certainly more than we are of surveillance tags.  But it could be considered most of us have our own form of tag anyway.  The word ‘cellular’ even sounds like it belongs in a prison.

Morri’s surprised many people in Blackburn when they pulled out of their move across the road to the old Thwaites’ Brewery site.  But maybe an alternative had already been found within their current premises.

Over a period of time a strange phenomenon has begun to take place in this superstore.  Tables started appearing in the walkways with assorted items on sale.  These started off with bakery products, including fruit pies, cakes and bread.  Then various other items started springing up in more places around the superstore walkways, the latest item to be on sale is garden and other furniture.

Going off on a tangent in relation to the instillation of furniture sales, what was very annoying was Morri’s removing their benches from where you entered the superstore from Railway Road.  They were a nice place to have a sit down after finishing your shopping, or before starting it.

With so many older and infirm people shopping in this superstore, it was nice to have somewhere where you could have a sit down to catch your breath and recuperate.  Sadly, they may have been seen as taking up too much room and another sales outlet could be installed there in the future.

This use of walkways as shopping aisles has raised murmurs about access for disabled users, especially those who use wheelchairs, along with people pushing prams and pushchairs.  Although there does seem to be enough room for users of various wheeled conveyances.  After all, plenty of similar sized shopping trolleys are pushed around the superstore every day.

Today’s retail industry is very cut-throat and competitive, particularly amongst the largest supermarket groups.  No doubt any opportunity to maximise profits through not spending money on building new premises can be seen by some as good business sense.  With the rise of online shopping and home delivery expected to keep on growing, some retail outlets are more likely to downsize than expand.

As one of Britain’s major supermarket groups, Morri’s is bound to tick all the boxes as regards health & safety and being disabled friendly.  But it’s addition of new sales outlets in its walkways may lead to the superstore starting to feel claustrophobic in certain places.

This cannot be conducive to improving their customers’ overall shopping experience. But then again it doesn’t take people long to get used to new shopping practices.  Shoplifters certainly do and will be all in favour of these new sales outlets in the walkways.

Blackburn town centre used to have a clock, built in 1848,  which was the pride and joy to many of our fellow townsfolk.

When it was demolished, due to town centre redevelopment, some people thought it was the end of the world.  Unfortunately these modernist styles used on its replacement didn’t go down very well with many folk.  It did look very tacky, not giving a good impression of our town.  It reflected the concrete jungle our town centre had become.

But laws of averages say you have to get it right eventually.  This has led to the current version of our clock tower, which dates from 2009, being given a grudging acceptance by most Blackburners.  This structure really serves two purposes, one is access to the Mall’s multi storey car park, the other is for its primary function.  The main problem of this purpose is doing what it was built for – telling the time!  But only one of its three clock faces ever has the correct time.  A similar situation plagued previous versions of our clock.

In May a note was made of each of the dial’s times in comparison to my mobile phone time.  At 11.35am on my phone it was this time on the dial looking down King William Street towards the Old Town Hall.  Sadly you can’t see what time it is from there due to a tall leafy tree in its way.  But the dial facing New Market Street was nearly an hour behind, stating a time of 10.40am.  The remaining dial, facing the Mall went back even further, giving a time of 9.25am.

If you came from the Azores, then walking down New Market Street towards the clock would make you feel at home, especially if you’d forgotten to put your watch forward by an hour.  Someone from Greenland coming from the Mall might feel the same way, with the remaining dial being two hours behind.

Unfortunately this means we have a very confusing situation – a clock which has three different times – and nobody can put their finger on it.  Civic Time website reported in 2010:  ‘The clock has three faces electronically locked so they always tell the correct time’.

Sadly, their statement has proved to be rather inaccurate.  What makes things worse is the length of time this has been going on for.  Even more surprising is how long this clock has been on the scene in Blackburn town centre by now.  Doesn’t time fly!

Last time Blackburn’s Easter Fair was held on Brown Street car park, suggestions were put forward over how to reduce costs of staging this event.

One of these suggestions was to build a hydro electric power plant, utilising Blackburn’s River Blakewater, which flows underneath the fairground site.  A turbine powered by flow from our subterranean river could produce not only enough electricity to run a fairground, but also make a contribution to Britain’s National Grid.  Profits from this could go on to help finance other worthy projects throughout our borough.

The fairground itself could then have other uses.  One idea is it being utilised as an exhibition centre and museum, displaying some of the ways Blackburn’s citizens used to be entertained before cinema, radio, TV and the internet were invented.  This could also lead to not only guided fairground tours, but also tours of the power station, underneath this complex.

A great deal of thought has gone into environmental impacts of this power station.  It would lead to special fish and amphibian channels having to be installed for eels, salmon, frogs and other marine creatures.  They would then have a safe passage allowing them to bypass its electricity turbine, which would produce green energy, in this case, hydro electric power.

Perhaps the most ingenious aspect of this project is a joint undertaking between both fairground and power station.  A big wheel would be constructed to blend in with the fairground, but would be actually producing auxiliary electricity separate from the power station, but also feeding into its National Grid supply.  This would be done by a hamster type wheel being installed on this site, where people can walk or run along its treadmill and produce electricity from their own steam.

A facility such as this could easily capture people’s imagination.  Local organisations could form their own teams and take part in walks along the big wheel, raising money for charity and local causes.  It could even be used as a form of voluntary punishment for minor criminal activity.  Electricity produced from walking the wheel would count as payment towards any fines incurred by convicted offenders.

One good thing about this fairground is it is only being temporary, like the one that sometimes parks up there each Easter.  As well as Brown St, the fairground has also parked up on Thwaites’ old brewery site.  Each visit to this site by the fairground is always a temporary one.  This may be the case with Blackburn’s proposed power generating project, but for just a bit longer.  Whereas a power station would be permanent.

Blackburn could be in line to cash in from these sand and dust storms which keep blowing over from the Sahara Desert.

A project is being considered to try and collect this sand and use it for various cottage industries.  We might even find ourselves in a ‘Coals to Newcastle’ scenario,  where we end up selling sand back to the Arabs.  From Blackburn’s Barbary Coast to theirs.

This phenomena of sand and dust blowing from North Africa seems to be becoming more of a regular thing, possibly due to effects of climate change.  It usually occurs when big dust storms in the Sahara Desert collide with southerly wind patterns.  Blackburn’s location in the middle of the island of Great Britain seems to indicate it may be in the driving seat of a vortex for receiving regular deposits of sand and dust from the world’s largest desert, it could eventually be classed as our own magic carpet.

One new cottage industry being talked about is the manufacture of hourglasses, using sand from the Sahara Desert.  This 8^th century device comes in all shapes and sizes and doesn’t necessarily have to be limited to an hour or any specific time.  They can be bought in various lengths of time measurement and are particularly useful for boiling eggs.

Blackburn also has a tradition for making glass appliances and is well known for this.  Many radio and TV valves were manufactured at the Mullards factory on Philips Road.  It may have been the town’s largest employer at one time.  Thousands of people worked there.

Before we get to finished products, this process has to start somewhere.  A new company has been formed to collect sand when it lands over Blackburn from the Sahara.  It is asking people to check smooth surfaces around their home next day whenever they hear news reports of another blast of sand being blown over here from the desert.

Cars are particularly prone to being covered in sand on occasions like these.  People are being asked to carefully brush sand off their cars into plastic receptacles, such as old margarine tubs or lunch boxes.  Anything which can be airtight sealed is very welcome.  Not only will this help local industry, but will also give your car a clean and help with our borough’s recycling plan.

The sands of time have been blowing through Blackburn for many a year, probably well before the hourglass was invented.  There have been good times and bad times.  But there is always an opportunity round the corner.