How Did We Build the Survey? Behind the Scenes of Claygate's Collective Effort.
Straight answer: People in Claygate created the survey so that Claygate's residents can tell Elmbridge Borough Council what they want.
Also: the Claygatge Village Association organised the campaign, but many volunteers worked together to make the survey a reality.
Here’s what happened:
In November 2023, more than two hundred residents told the CVA what they felt was special about Claygate and what needed protecting (read the previous blog to learn about the November meeting). At the end of that meeting, an appeal was made for people to join working groups to work on particular focus areas. Ninety volunteers signed up for the six key areas:
Housing
Shops and Businesses
Transport and Parking
Health and Wellbeing
Environment
Recreation and Leisure
Everyone was welcome to participate in the working groups and the volunteers brought a great range of skills and expertise.
Working groups then began to meet to figure out how to preserve those special attributes of Claygate and what the future of Claygate should look like. This, of course, included how the village navigates requirements for new housing, traffic in and through the village, preservation of our green spaces, safeguarding our community and village lifestyle, and much more.
The Shops and Businesses group felt that it was important to know how residents feel about the shops and businesses in the village and what affects their shopping choices, including parking. The group created a small survey covering shops and businesses in the village.
The CVA Trustees and main steering group of the “Claygate: The Way Forward” campaign thought that a survey was the right way to take the pulse of the village as a whole and decided to develop the shops and businesses survey to cover all key areas. Each working group then contributed questions about their particular area for the village-wide survey.
A local volunteer researcher has expertly brought together all the questions and designed a survey that takes about ten minutes, plus there are opportunities to write more if you want to and have the time. The responses to the survey will help us know how best to represent the views of the village.
As soon as the survey closes, we are planning some focus groups for key areas.
If you would like to be part of a focus group discussing any of the areas in more depth, please contact us via claygatevillageassociation.org/contact or come and talk to us on Saturday 23rd March between 9 am and 12.30 pm at the Parade.
You’ll see posters, banners and flyers all over Claygate with QR codes or simply click this link to take part. This is our village. Share your views. Take the survey now.
And please tell your Claygate friends and family. We would really like to hear from more young adults between 16 and 24 years old.