OK time for a rant I think.
Next time you take a walk on the streets of any sizeable UK town or city look down. Firstly you’ll see what an increasingly untidy place this once-sceptred isle has become. Seems people are quite happy to dump any and indeed all their miscellaneous crap in public. Since I started doing this I’ve noted not just the usual suspects: aluminium cans, plastic bottles and crisp packets but random pieces of clothing! A sock here, a T-shirt there! Extraordinarily inexplicable!
Once upon a time we had a very prominent anti-litter campaign – ‘Keep Britain Tidy’. If anyone knows what happened to this please shout. And its not just me. An American friend of mine who is studying for his doctorate here quipped that Bill Bryson’s famous travel book should be renamed ‘Notes from a Messy Country’. Personally I’d like to go around to the homes of the worst offenders and have the crap they’ve chucked dumped in their bedroom or garden – mind you they are probably a dump anyway. I’ve written repeatedly to my local councillors who basically do nothing except trumpet meaningless initiatives. I have specifically asked for details of how many fixed penalties have been issued in the last 12 months – surprisingly they never got back to me with that.
Anyway look again and look harder and you’ll see that almost every pavement is pock-marked by old chewing gum. Take a close look – its not the odd random piece but 1000s of pieces of the damned stuff. Again no excuse except bone-idleness and a f**k you attitude. First of all -- WAKE UP PEOPLE CHEWING GUM IS NOT BIODEGRADABLE YET.
Solution? Well we could go the way of Singapore and ban the stuff, although even I accept that this is somewhat excessive. Alternatively we can fine people heavily for just chucking the stuff/spitting it out (all those cameras have to be good for something) until research into biodegradable gum produces a viable alternative. http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/pda/A172342?s_id=10
And finally – while you are looking at the pavement please note what a hotchpotch patchwork quilt of uneven concrete/tarmac it has now become. Since the privatisation and de-regulation of the utilities these companies have been free to dig up the roads whenever they choose to make repairs, change mains, lay new cable, lay broadband, phone lines etc etc. One road in Kent was dug up 37 times in 18 months – that’s every fortnight on average!! http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/2720345.stm
Next time you take a walk on the streets of any sizeable UK town or city look down. Firstly you’ll see what an increasingly untidy place this once-sceptred isle has become. Seems people are quite happy to dump any and indeed all their miscellaneous crap in public. Since I started doing this I’ve noted not just the usual suspects: aluminium cans, plastic bottles and crisp packets but random pieces of clothing! A sock here, a T-shirt there! Extraordinarily inexplicable!
Once upon a time we had a very prominent anti-litter campaign – ‘Keep Britain Tidy’. If anyone knows what happened to this please shout. And its not just me. An American friend of mine who is studying for his doctorate here quipped that Bill Bryson’s famous travel book should be renamed ‘Notes from a Messy Country’. Personally I’d like to go around to the homes of the worst offenders and have the crap they’ve chucked dumped in their bedroom or garden – mind you they are probably a dump anyway. I’ve written repeatedly to my local councillors who basically do nothing except trumpet meaningless initiatives. I have specifically asked for details of how many fixed penalties have been issued in the last 12 months – surprisingly they never got back to me with that.
Anyway look again and look harder and you’ll see that almost every pavement is pock-marked by old chewing gum. Take a close look – its not the odd random piece but 1000s of pieces of the damned stuff. Again no excuse except bone-idleness and a f**k you attitude. First of all -- WAKE UP PEOPLE CHEWING GUM IS NOT BIODEGRADABLE YET.
Solution? Well we could go the way of Singapore and ban the stuff, although even I accept that this is somewhat excessive. Alternatively we can fine people heavily for just chucking the stuff/spitting it out (all those cameras have to be good for something) until research into biodegradable gum produces a viable alternative. http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/pda/A172342?s_id=10
And finally – while you are looking at the pavement please note what a hotchpotch patchwork quilt of uneven concrete/tarmac it has now become. Since the privatisation and de-regulation of the utilities these companies have been free to dig up the roads whenever they choose to make repairs, change mains, lay new cable, lay broadband, phone lines etc etc. One road in Kent was dug up 37 times in 18 months – that’s every fortnight on average!! http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/2720345.stm
Sometimes councils spend £1000s putting in new surfaced pavements and roads only for the utility companies to dig them up straight away. In Huddersfield 2 weeks ago a water company dug up the newly surfaced road within 48 hours! So no aesthetically pleasing pavements in the near future! Although I am told that councils have new powers now to regulate this, I don’t expect them to start enforcing it soon – but this is a democracy and since councillors do need to be elected (even if by fewer and fewer people) if it irritates you as much as me – e-mail them and give ‘em hell! http://www.writetothem.com/
5 comments:
nah, ban the stuff. What good does it do anyway? It makes the chewer look like a cow as well
The Solution. GO the way of Louisiana... CHAIN GANGS!!
Keep Britain Tidy is now Encams/Tidy Britain Group, who got laughed at a while back for a spectacularly embarrassing youth poster campaign, thinking they were being all clever with segmentation research.
I hate 'em, personally. Simpletons who believe Fixing Broken Windows and that.
Fine em... seems everyone else is except Guildford council. But if you want to go to extremes...
Sodus town in Wayne county New York state (near Canadian border) recently passed a “litter bug exterminator” law, complete with a $1,000 fine!!
madness though... some councils are fining people for putting a wrong item in their actual bins, or their recycling bins but doing sweet F.A. about street litter.
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