Oxford Venue and Conference Hire

“places to rent by the hour or the day”

Location: Oxford

For locations to hold meetings, lectures, seminars, team building exercises, conferences, training, interviews, auditions, parties, weddings and other events in this historic city of Oxford in England. Oxford has a range of facilities to hire including: Historic buildings · Oxford Castle Venue Hire · Oxford Museum Venues · Blenheim Palace Universities  · Oxford University Conference Facilities  · Oxford Brookes University Conference Facilities For other venues in Oxford   Oxford City Centre Meeting Venues For London Venues for Hire

Headington Library Read In Saturday 5 February 2011

Save Headington Library

campaigning to save Headington’s Library in Oxford from closure

Several of Headington’s finest writers participated today in an event staged by Save Headington Library Group as part of its campaign to fight against the proposed closure of Headington’s only local library.

Amongst the writers who participated included novelist and artist Brian Aldiss, Mail on Sunday columnist and writer Peter Hitchens, Mark Thompson, David Boyd Haycock, Mini Grey and Helen Cooper. To find out more see http://saveheadingtonlibrary.blogspot.com/2011/02/headington-library-read-in-saturday-5.html or http://saveheadingtonlibrary.blogspot.com/

Oxford Fashion Week

Oxford Fashion
For the latest and best in fashion for men and women

Jaeger Check out Pixie Lott wearing Boutique by Jaeger after performing on Daybreak on Friday. Jasper Garvida Giselle Top Most girls have longed to emulate the grace and elegance of a ballerina. For Spring Summer 2011, Jasper Garvida has made that fantasy a reality, by channeling the sophistication and innocence found at the ballet, into the Giselle top. However, don’t be fooled by its girly façade, the Giselle top will give you a killer silhouette that will make you feel all woman. Made from silk organza the Giselle top mirrors the kind of spectacular movement that can normally only be achieved by donning your finest tutu! And, Vango sponsors coastal walker on Trees for Life Challenge This week, Andreas Gschwari (34), an IT designer from Guildford, Surrey, will begin the gruelling challenge of walking the entire British coastline in a year – all to raise funds for conservation charity Trees for Life which works to restore the Caledonian Forest in the Scottish Highlands. Sponsored by Vango, Andreas will spend all of 2011 and early 2012 on his epic ‘Walking for Trees’ adventure, covering over 4,600 miles (7,400 km) on foot. After setting off from Brighton on Sunday 6th February, he will walk the entire main island of the United Kingdom plus several outlying islands. If all goes to plan, he will to return to Brighton on 11th February 2012. Oxford Fashion Week to Support the next Generation of Students Combining Fashion and Philanthropy, Oxford Fashion Week’s most luxurious, high fashion event, the couture show, is being run in support of the Oxford Thinking Campaign. The show, which is a white tie, high end fashion event featuring designers such as Matthew Williamson and Nicole Farhi as well as two top Russian designers, will also showcase a charity auction so that audience members can return home with a couture item of their very own. Among the donated items are; an Alexander McQueen bag, valued at £600 and a dress from Couture designer Da Sara, with a value of £6,000. OXFORD FASHION WEEK SETS ETHICAL TREND For the first time ever, Oxford Fashion Week will be hosting an ethical fashion show alongside its couture, concept, lingerie and style shows. On Friday 4 March, 14 ethical fashion designers will be showcasing their collections at the Living Room as part of Oxford Fashion Week 2011. The show is being produced by award winning ethical designer Feng Ho, who uses a range of sustainable textiles such as bamboo, soy, organic cotton and hemp. End-of-line textiles from British fabric merchants are also utilised in her creations.

The critical issue is capacity – a response to TaxPayers’ Alliance view on HSR

By: Julie Mills 4 feb 2011

  Successive Transport Ministers have recognised that there is a problem of capacity on our national transport networks. The question is: what is the best way to address the problem, what answer offers best value for money and represents the most sustainable approach?

“High Speed Two has been compared with options that centre on incremental investment on existing railway lines and it is evident that HS2 represents the best value for money answer”, said Greengauge 21 Director Jim Steer. He was responding to claims by the TaxPayers’ Alliance that there is no robust economic case for the project.

The alternative rail options examined by the Department of Transport include ‘Rail Package 2’, an upgrade to the West Coast Main Line which the TaxPayers’ Alliance says ‘has a much better benefit cost ratio’. But  once the need to maintain reliability levels on what would become an extremely busy railway is taken into account, the benefit cost ratio is lower than HS2 delivers:

Rail alternatives to HS2

Package	Description	Seating capacity uplift	Cost	BCR
Rail Package 2	Additional 4 – 5 trains/hour on the West Coast Main Line	+54%	£3.7bn	2.19
HS2	10-14 new high-capacity trains/hour	+200%	£15.8-£17.4bn	2.4

 

HS2 delivers economic benefits 2.4 times as high as its costs. Clearly the alternative of an existing route upgrade  is of a differing scale. But other rail investment packages have been examined which increase capacity beyond the levels of Rail Package 2 on the West Coast Main Line and they have ever diminishing benefit cost ratios.

This is important because the capacity shortfall being faced on the West Coast Main Line will clearly be greater than the uplift provided by Rail Package  2. As Network Rail says of HS2 in its recent WCML Route Utilisation Strategy:

“It would not be possible for the rail industry to resolve the future capacity gap on the south end of the West Coast Main Line effectively in any other way”.

This highlights a second area of contention: demand forecasts. The work by HS2 Ltd uses an estimate of underlying growth in rail demand of +3.4% per annum. This is close to recent estimates of future annual growth by Network Rail in the corridor and is generally lower than has been experienced in recent years: http://www.oxfordprospect.co.uk/The-critical-issue-is-capacity-about-HS2.html

European Natural Gas Demand, Supply, and Pricing: Cycles, Seasons, and the Impact of LNG Price Arbitrage

 ”by Anouk Honore”

A book review by Nicholas Newman 4 February 2011

 The Problem

Predicting the future is always problematic and a complex matter, forecasting the future shape of Europe’s gas markets over the next ten to twenty years for Europe’s decision makers, some would say is an almost impossible task! For instance, forecasting future gas demand is full of unknowns, including the shape of prices, the impact of improvements in energy efficiency, the timing of Europe’s economic recovery to when rival coal and nuclear power plants will come on stream, since such capacity investment will have a negative impact on gas demand. http://www.oxfordprospect.co.uk/European-Natural-Gas-Demand,-Supply,-and-Pricing-Cycles,-Seasons,-and-the-Impact-of-LNG-Price-Arbitrage.html